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Chemical composition, dry matter and crude protein digestibilities of some tropical browse plants estimated in vitro

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 February 2018

C. M. Shayo
Affiliation:
Zonal Research and Training Centre, Livestock Production Research Institute, PO Box 202, Mpwapwa, Tanzania
P. Udén
Affiliation:
Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Department of Animal Nutrition and Management, PO Box 7024, S - 750 07, Uppsala, Sweden
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Extract

Browse plants are generally regarded as important food resources for ruminants in the tropics due to their high levels of nitrogen. Particularly during the dry season livestock eat browse which may contain considerable amounts of phenolic compounds including tannins at levels of up to half of the dry matter (Reed, 1986). Tannins are known to react with proteins to form rumen undegradable or totally indigestible complexes.

A uniform food fraction is assumed to have the same true digestibility irrespective of source and level in the food. In the test of uniformity developed by Lucas (1964) and applied by Van Soest (1967) the digestible fraction per unit food is regressed upon its concentration in the food. The slope of the line gives its true digestibility, the intercept, the potential metabolic fraction and the variation around the regression line explains the extent of uniformity of the fraction.

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Copyright
Copyright © British Society of Animal Science 1998

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