Performance Evaluation of Moringa oleifera and Available Roughages (Maize and Australian Sweet Jumbo) on Feeding Values of Growing BLRI Cattle Breed-1 (BCB-1) Bulls

Abstract

The present experiment was conducted to evaluate intake, digestibility and growth performances of local growing bulls fed Moringa plant fodder or Australian Sweet Jumbo alone keeping Maize silage as control and to scaling up the available roughages. Eighteen BLRI Cattle Breed-1(BCB-1) growing bulls of 103.8±25.5 Kg live weight were randomly allocated to three dietary groups designed in a completely randomized design, having six animals in each group. The three experimental diets were Australian Sweet Jumbo silage and Moringa foliages considered as treatments and Maize silage keeping as control. Daily DM intake of bulls fed Moringa foliage was significantly higher (p<0.01) than those fed with Maize or AS Jumbo. A similar trend in CP (p<0.001) and OM (p<0.01) intake was found among the roughages. Compared feeding with AS Jumbo silage, the relative DM intake was increased (p<0.01) by 11.79 and 26.02 per cent, respectively for bulls fed Maize and Moringa foliages. The digestible DM, DCP, DE, ME and MP intake was significantly higher (p<0.001) in bulls fed with Moringa than the bulls fed with other roughages. Digestibility coefficient of nutrients reflected that Moringa foliage had the highest DM, CP, or OM digestibility, and they were significantly (p<0.001) higher than that of Maize or AS Jumbo. However, AS Jumbo fed bulls had a significantly (P<0.01) lower digestibility of DM, OM or CP. Maize had the highest NDF digestibility compared to other two roughages. However, the ADF digestibility of Maize, AS Jumbo and Moringa foliage did not differ significantly (p>0.05). Feeding Moringa foliage had significantly (p<0.05)  higher average daily gain of 376 g compared to 289g of Maize or 218 g of AS Jumbo with an average feed conversion efficiency of 8.85, 11.52 and 13.08 respectively. It was concluded that Moringa oleifera had higher nutritional significance and less cost of production compared to Maize and Australian Sweet (AS) Jumbo silages.