Hostname: page-component-77c89778f8-m8s7h Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-18T11:59:45.286Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Gut fill in cattle: effect of pasture quality on fasting losses

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 September 2010

A. V. Goodchild
A. V. Goodchild
Affiliation:
Livestock Production Research Institute, Private Bag, Mpwapwa, Tanzania
Get access

Abstract

An abrupt fall in live weight of grazing cattle occurs at the beginning of the growing season in the seasonally dry tropics. In an experiment with grazing crossbred bulls in central Tanzania designed to monitor changes in gut fill, 16 were slaughtered in the dry season and 14 in the early wet season. Bulls were measured and weighed before, and weighed after, a 20-h fast and then slaughtered. Gut fill was measured and empty body weight (EBW) calculated.

During fasting, the ratio gut fill/EBW fell from 0·291 to 0·217 in the dry season and from 0·207 to 0·119 in the wet season. Heart girth/EBW1/3 was 0·2577 and 0·2567 m/kg1/3 in the dry and wet seasons respectively.

It was concluded that live weight before or after fasting is seriously affected by season and can give biased predictions of EBW change. On the other hand, heart girth is little affected by season and can be used to monitor relative increases or decreases of EBW within animals.

Type
Research Article
Information
Animal Production , Volume 40 , Issue 3 , June 1985 , pp. 455 - 463
Copyright
Copyright © British Society of Animal Science 1985

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Agricultural Research Council. 1980. The Nutrient Requirements of Ruminant Livestock. Commonwealth Agricultural Bureaux, Slough.Google Scholar
Bailey, P. J. and Bishop, A. H. 1975. Liveweight change, grazing time of steers and effect of pasture height on liveweight change following periods of hand feeding. Aust. J. exp. Agric. Anim. Husb. 15: 440–445.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bass, J. J. and Duganzich, D. M. 1980. A note on the effect of starvation on the bovine alimentary tract and its contents. Anim. Prod. 31: 111–113.Google Scholar
Bath, D. L., Ronning, M., Lofgreen, G. P. and Meyer, J. H. 1966. Influence of variations in ruminal contents upon estimates of body weight change of dairy cattle during restricted feeding. J. Dairy Sci. 49: 830–834.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bines, J. A. and Davey, A. W. F. 1970. Voluntary intake, digestion, rate of passage, amount of material n i the alimentary tract and behaviour in cows receiving complete diets containing straw and concentrates in different proportions. Br. J. Nutr. 24: 1013–1028.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
French, M. H. 1943. The compositions and nutritive values of Tanganyika feeding stuffs. E. Afr. agric. J. 8: 126–132.Google Scholar
French, M. H. 1956. The importance of water in the management of cattle. E. Afr. agric. J. 21: 171–181.Google Scholar
Grassland Research Institute. 1953. Studies of variability in liveweight. Grassld Res. Inst. Experiments in Progress, No. 6, pp. 62–63.Google Scholar
Hughes, J. G. 1976. Short-term variation in animal live weight and reduction of its effect on weighing. Anim. Breed. Abstr. 44: 111–118.Google Scholar
Ivins, J. D. and Morgan, J. T. 1957. Note on the extent and significance of losses in live weight of inwintered cattle on turning out to grass in spring. J. Br. Grassld Soc. 12: 19–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tayler, J. C. 1954. Technique of weighing the grazing animal Proc. Br. Soc. Anim. Prod. pp. 3–16.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tayler, J. C., Alder, F. E. and Rudman, J. E. 1957. Fill and carcass changes of yard-fed and outwintered beef cattle turned on to spring pasture. Nature, Lond. 179: 197–198.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Whiteman, J. V., Loggins, P. F., Chambers, D., Pope, L. S. and Stephens, D. F. 1954. Some sources of error in weighing steers off grass. J. Anim. Sci. 13: 832–842.CrossRefGoogle Scholar