The evaluation of nutrient quality of ramie leaves silage and hay in complete mixed ration for Etawah-Crossbreed goat using in vitro technique Despal *, Hutabarat, I.M.L., Mutia, R. and Permana, I.G. Faculty of Animal Science, Bogor Agricultural University despal@ipb.ac.id Abstract A research have been conducted to evaluate the effect of ramie leaves silage and hay in Etawah Crossbreed (PE) goat complete mixed ration (CMR) on nutrient content, fermentability, and digestibility by in vitro. There were seven CMR dietary treatments i.e. P0 (control ration) = 50% napier grass + 50% concentrate, P1 = 30% napier grass + 20% ramie leaves silage + 50% concentrate, P2 = 20% napier grass + 30% ramie leaves silage + 50% concentrate, P3 = 10% napier grass + 40% ramie leaves silage + 50% concentrate, P4 = 30% napier grass + 20% ramie leaves hay + 50% concentrate, P5 = 20% napier grass + 30% ramie leaves hay + 50% concentrate, and P6 = 10% napier grass + 40% hay + 50% concentrate. Both ramie leaves silage and hay increased the CMR digestibility and nutrient content, except the crude fiber. Control ration had a higher crude fiber than silage and hay. The CMR which contain ramie leaves silage (40%) had higher nutrient digestibilities compared to the other rations. Rations which were added with ramie leaves silage (P1 P3) had a higher VFA concentration compared to the other rations. Ammonia concentration of rations added with preserved ramie leaves were lower than control, however ammonia concentration in all treatments were in optimal range. Acetate proportion was higher in CMR which contain ramie leaves hay than CMR which contain silage and the nutrients digestibilities were lower. Adding ramie leaves silage in rations resulted higher propionate and butyrate proportion than control and rations which added with ramie leaves hay. Either silage or hay ramie leaves can be used up to 40% as Napier grass substitute in the PE CMR. Keywords: Etawah goat, hay, ramie leaves, silage Introductions Ramie leaves are byproduct from ramie (Boehmeria nivea) plantation that produced fiber for textile raw materials. Currently, ramie plantations are widely expanded in Garut and Wonosobo regencies. The previous research showed that
ramie leaves contained all major nutrients which were needed by animal (Duarte et al., 1997). Sufficiently high crude protein content (20%) and crude fibre (16%) exhibited that ramie leaves could be used as forage to fulfill dairy nutrient requirement like PE goat. Despal (2007) explained that supplementation of dried ramie leaves until 33% in ration based on field grass prevented sheep losing body weight loss during dry season and gave positive growth. Ramie leaves available periodically depend on stem harvest at 25 40 days interval. Harvesting occur at the same time and in great quantity. Each hectare of ramie plantation could produce forages up to 300 ton fresh material/year (FAO, 2005) or equivalent to 42 ton dry matter. Preservation of ramie leaves was necessary so that ramie leaves could be utilized more efficiently and being used as animal daily feed. General preservations of forages are wet (silage) and dry (hay) preservations. Each technique has advantages and disadvantages. Drying with open sun drying technique is a cheap forage conserving method. However, forage excess generally occur at rainy season so there is a needed for technology to handle the constraint. Whereas wet preservation (silage) is hampered by low water soluble carbohydrate (WSC) and high water content that may produce a low quality of silage. According to Despal and Permana (2008), ramie leaves dried by greenhouse technique produced better quality of hay than drying by open sun drying and oven technique. Adding dried cassava 20% (w/w) in silage ramie leaves produced better quality of silage than silage which were added with corn and pollard. The quality of preserved ramie leaves needed to be tested in ration. The objective of the research was to study preserved ramie leaves using wet and dry preservation as grass substitute in PE goat ration and their effect on nutrient content, fermentability and in vitro digestibility. Materials and Methods This research was conducted from November 2008 to March 2009 at Agrostology Laboratory, Dairy Animal Nutrition Laboratory, Department of Nutrition and Feed Technology, Faculty of Animal Science, Bogor Agricultural
University, Laboratory of Inter University Center, Bogor Agricultural University, and Laboratory of Nutrition Physiology, Animal Research Center, Ciawi. Ramie leaves were obtained from Koperasi Pondok Pesantren (Koppontren) Darusalam, Garut Regency. As many as 2 kg of ramie leaves, that was chopped into a length of approximately 1,5 2 cm using forage chopper, added with 400 grams of dried cassava to make the silage. Silage was stored in plastic (28 x 50 cm) and rewrapped with plastic and polybag (60 x 120 cm) to avoid light intervention. Silages were incubated anaerobically for 35 days. After 35 days, silages were dried, ground, and mixed in ration. Hay was made by drying ramie leaves in greenhouse for 21 hours under intensive light and the hay was twisted every 2 hours. After 21 hours light intensities, hay was ground and mixed in ration. The forage which used in ration was napier grass whereas the concentrate consisted of corn, pollard, rice bran, pressed coconut cake, dried cassava, CaCO 3, and DCP. Chemical composition of ingredients which were used in complete mixed ration was appeared in Table 1. Table 1. Ingredients and its Chemical Composition No. Feed Ingredient DM Ash CP EE CF TDN Ca P --------------------- (%) ---------------------- 1. Ramie hay 90.43 21.57 14.02 3.70 13.09 52.79 4.65 2.18 2. Ramie silage 90.10 17.90 10.20 4.41 11.10 62.30 3.98 0.17 3. Napier grass 22.20 12.00 8.69 2.71 32.30 52.40 0.48 0.35 4. Rice bran 87.70 13.60 13.00 8.64 13.90 67.90 0.09 1.39 5. Pollard 88.50 5.90 18.50 3.86 9.80 69.20 0.23 1.10 6. Pressed coconut cake 88.60 8.20 21.30 10.90 14.20 78.70 0.17 0.62 7. Corn 86.80 2.20 10.80 4.28 3.50 80.80 0.23 0.41 8. Dried cassava 79.50 4.70 2.60 7.00 5.70 78.50 0.17 0.09 Complete ration was mixed appropriately according to formula (Table 2). Complete ration was formulated based on the nutrient requirement of lactating PE having 30 kg BW and produce 1 kg milk/d (4% FCM). The ration contained 66.5% TDN, 11.17% CP, 0.41% Ca, and 0.29% P (NRC, 1981). Nutrients content, i.e. dry matter (DM), crude protein (CP), crude fibre (CF), ether extract (EE), and ash were analyzed according to AOAC (1999). Fermentability and in vitro digestibility were determined as described by Tilley and Terry (1969),
NH 3 Analysis was conducted according to General Laboratory Procedure (1966), and partial VFA were analyzed with gas chromatography using Chrompack method (1998). Data were subjected to analysis of variance (ANOVA) using SPSS 17 procedure. Significant differences between individual means were identified using Duncan s multiple tests. Table 2. Formula of Dietary Treatments in Research Feed Ingredient P0 P1 P2 P3 P4 P5 P6 ----------------- (%) ----------------- Ramie hay 0 0 0 0 20 30 40 Ramie silage 0 20 30 40 0 0 0 Napier grass 50 30 20 10 30 20 10 Rice bran 10 10 12 7.87 10 10 10 Pollard 10.39 17.67 17.85 23.16 15.64 19.74 18.42 Pressed coconut cake 7.32 11.8 13.67 15.09 5 5 5 Corn 18 9.03 5 3 13.09 7.04 5 Dried cassava 3.94 0 0 0 10 10 15 CaCO 3 0.35 1 1 0.38 1 0 0 DCP 0 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.28 0 0 TDN 66.5 66.5 66.91 68 66.5 66.5 66.5 PK 12 12 12 12 12 12 12 Ca 0.41 1.518 1.879 2 1.584 1.558 1.982 P 0.561 0.614 0.635 0.589 0.462 0.455 0.436 Results and Discussions Nutrient Composition of Complete Ration Proximate composition of the complete ration is presented on Table 3. Statistical analysis showed that nutrient composition among treatments ration were significantly different (P<0.05). Substitution between napier grass and ramie leaves hay on level 20% decreases the DM weight of ration, but it was still higher than the DM weight of the control ration. Substitute between napier grass and silage 20% caused the DM weight of ration was lower than of the control ration. On higher level substitute (30% and 40%), DM weight of ration that was produced were higher than control. The difference of ration s DM weight was not only because of hay and silage alone, but also because of other ingredients (Table 1).
Ash shows the mineral contents of the substances. Generally, substitution of king grass with ramie increased the ash-content. This was because of the higher ashcontent of both preserved ramie leaves compared to napier grass. The higher ramie hay and silage on ration, the higher ash-content was. Substitution of napier grass with ramie leaves hay increased the ration s ash-content higher compared to substitution with silage. This was because of the ash-content on ramie leaves hay was higher than on ramie leaves silage (Table 1). Ash-content of ramie leaves was dominated by Ca that ranging from 4 5%. High content of 6% Ca on ramie leaves was also reported by Duarte et al. (1997). The high content of Ca on ramie leaves was expected to be more available for dairy animals than inorganic Ca that usually added in ration (McDowell, 2003). Ration fat-content (EE) that contained both preserved ramie leaves (silage and hay) were not different with control. Ration containing 40% silage had higher EE content than control and ration containing hay on every level. Because of that, the higher silage level that was added, the higher EE content was on ration. On the contrary, the higher hay level added, the lower EE content was. Crude fat-content on ration was high because of the high percentage of pressed coconut cake (Table 2). Table 3. Nutrient Composition of Complete Ration Treatments DM (%) Ash EE CP CF (% DM) (% DM) (% DM) (% DM) P0 82,17 b 10,01 a 4,52 abc 12,97 a 23,78 e P1 81,23 a 10,81 a 2,83 a 13,69 ab 16,97 cd P2 86,15 e 11,11 b 5,21 bc 12,69 a 14,29 bc P3 86,14 e 11,17 b 5,58 d 13,16 abc 11,45 a P4 85,26 e 12,03 b 4,75 bc 13,83 bcd 16,53 d P5 83,92 d 14,26 c 3,77 ab 14,52 d 17,18 d P6 83,86 c 14,94 c 3,94 abc 14,31 cd 13,08 ab Different superscript in the same column differ significantly (P < 0.05). Ration containing hay ramie leaves had a higher CP content than control. Hay ramie leaves contained of 14.01% crude protein were able to increase the CP content of the ration significantly. Eventhough, it was not obviously different, ration containing silage ramie leaves had a higher CP content than control. There was no obvious different caused by the level of hay-added on CP content of ration. The low CP content on using silage was proceed from dried cassava-added on hay ramie leaves that has 2.6% CP content. The use of dried cassava-added on ensilage had
caused ramie ensilage to have content of 10.2% CP, which was not really different with napier grass (8.9%). Ration that consisted of preserved ramie leaves had a lower CF content than control. This was because of lower CF content on preserved ramie leaves compared to napier grass. The higher use of preserved ramie leaves (hay or silage) in the ration, the lower crude fiber-content on ration was. The lower crude fiber-content on ration was expected to cause a higher digestibility. According to Despal (2000), crude fiber had a negative correlation to digestibility. The lower crude fiber was, the higher digestibility of the ration was. But, the very low crude fiber on dairy animal ration can intrude the syntheses of milk fat that impacted on the lowering of milk production. This was because of the low content of crude fiber deliver the VFA pattern that has more proportion of molar propionate acid. Propionate was much more used as energy reserve and a bit as syntheses of milk fat. Seymour et al. (2005) reported that the content of milk fat had a negative correlation with propionate and butyrate content of the diet but had a positive correlation with acetate. Fermentability and Digestibility Ration fermentability can be measured by VFA production as the product of organic matter fermentation and NH 3 as the fermentation product from protein. VFA was the main energy source to ruminant livestock and was an output from the ration fermentation on rumen (Orskov and Ryle, 1990). On that account, VFA production on rumen could be used as an indicator on ration fermentability (Hartati, 1998). VFA profile (molar proportion of VFA) that yielded could be used to describe whether a ration was approprioate to the livestock. The influence of adding ramie leaves silage and hay on ration fermentability was shown on Table 4. Statistical analysis resulted that organic matter and protein fermentability of the ration were not showing any different among treatments (P>0.05). Table 4: Fermentability of complete ration VFA (mm/l) )* NH 3 Perlakuan Acetate Propionate Isobutyrate Butyrate Isovalerate Total (mm/l) P0 26,25 4,44 0,62 2,67 0,32 34,30 11,46
P1 26,31 5,47 0,37 3,16 0,31 35,62 10,30 P2 27,74 6,56 0,58 3,75 0,40 39,03 10,62 P3 24,78 6,38 0,39 3,65 0,27 35,47 9,67 P4 22,57 4,57 0,52 2,93 0,15 30,74 8,42 P5 25,27 4,13 0,47 2,37 0,19 32,43 9,70 P6 18,42 3,20 0,31 2,31 0,11 24,35 8,94 According to Sutardi (1980), the optimal range of ration VFA was 80-160 mm. Total VFA that yielded in this study was so low compared to range of VFA that was needed for the optimal growth of rumen microorganism. This was because of the different measurement method, in case on this research VFA was measured by GC, whereas on Sutardi (1980), the measurement was done using steam destilation. The low values of VFA on measurement using GC were also found by Despal (2005); Madrid et al., (1999); and McCullough and Sisk (1972). On steam distillation methods, all volatile substances are counted as VFA, but not in VFA measured using GC. Ration containing hay was less fermentable than ration containing silages. This was because of microorganism activity on the ensilage helped digesting the feedstuffs and caused silage in the rumen system more fermentable. The same result was also found by Schingoethe et al. (1976). Acetic acid was present in greatest amount and the proportion of propionic acid usually exceeded that of butyric (Balch and Rowland, 1956). Acetate proportions to total VFA of the respective rations were 76.5%; 73.9%; 71.1%; 69.9%; 73.4%, 77.9% and 75.6%. The use of silage (P1 P3) gave a lower acetate proportion than control. The higher use of silage on ration, the lower acetate proportion was. This was because of the lower content of CF in silage containing ration compare to control (McCullough and Sisk, 1972). The use of hay on certain level might reduce acetate proportion, however not as much as on silage. On the use of hay as much as 30%, acetate proportion was seen higher compared to control. The high proportion of acetate on the use of hay can be found on Esdale et al. (1968). Ammonia was the main source of nitrogen to synthesize the microorganism s protein, so its concentration on rumen was a case that had to be observed (Satter and Slyter, 1974). According to McDonald et al. (2002), the range of NH 3 optimal concentration to synthesize the rumen microorganism s protein was 6 21 mm. The
NH 3 that yielded from protein fermentation on the experimental rations were on optimal range for the growth of livestock and not excessive. Digestibility was an early indication on the availability of nutrients in certain feed to livestock (Yusmadi, 2008). The influence on hay-added and silage-added to ration on in vitro digestibility is shown on Table 5. Statistical analysis resulted that ration treatment highly influential (P<0.01) to ration DM and OM digestibility. Table 5: In vitro digestibility of complete ration Treatments DMD (%) OMD (%) P0 61,21 a 60,40 a P1 66,33 abc 66,22 abc P2 69,53 bc 69,25 c P3 71,91 c 72,33 c P4 66,81 abc 67,44 bc P5 61,63 ab 61,89 ab P6 65,00 ab 66,14 abc Different superscripts at the same column showing significant differences at P < 0.01. Ramie leaves silage-added to ration increased the DM and OM digestibility in line with the increasing level. The increasing of digestibility also happened on hay ramie leaves-added however not as much as on silage. Moreover, on 30% hay-added on ration gave a relative same digestibility to control. A higher digestibility of silage compared to hay was also found by Yusmadi (2008). Dry matter and organic matter pattern was inversely proportional to CF ration. The higher CF was, the lower digestibility was. This case was in mutual according to Despal (2000). The increasing of OM digestibility was in line with increasing of DM digestibility. As reported by Sutardi (1980), because of most components of DM were consisted of OM so that factors that influenced DM digestibility, could also influence OM digestibility. Conclusions Ramie leaves silage and hay used as substitute for napier grass may improve nutrient content and ration digestibility. Eventhough ration fermentability using
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