Assessment of the Feeding Systems and Feed Resources of Dairy Cattle in Lemu-Bilbilo Wereda Dairy Products-Processing Cooperatives, Arsi Zone of Oromia Regional State, Ethiopia
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2008-06
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Abstract
This study was conducted in Lemu-Bilbilo Wereda, Arsi Zone of Oromia Regional State on members of the dairy products processing cooperatives with the objective of characterizing the feeding systems, and feed resources in terms of quantity and quality in the study area. One hundred fifty one households owning dairy cattle and supplying milk to the cooperatives during the study period were selected purposely. A structured questionnaire format was prepared and an interview of each household was carried out to collect data on household structure and farming system characteristics, feeding systems, available feed resources and their nutritional qualities, dairy cattle feeding practices and performance of dairy cattle. Feed samples were collected from natural pastures, crop aftermath, crop residues, concentrates and tree legumes to estimate total DM yield and nutrient composition of the feedstuffs. Standard methodologies were followed to collect the feed samples and analyses their chemical composition. Descriptive statistics was used to analyze the data using SPSS. The results of this study showed that the average livestock herd size per household in terms of TLU was 20.44 (SE=0.87), cattle (16.12 TLU, SE=0.72) that represented 78.86% of the total herd size. About 39.20% of the cattle herd sizes were composed of crossbred while 60.80% were indigenous. Cows represent 51.05% of the total cattle herd followed by oxen that represent 28.47%. The objective of cattle keeping in majority of the farms was for milk, draught, income and meat purpose. Crop-livestock mixed farming was the commonly used farming system. Cereals, pulses, and oil seeds are the major crops grown in the study area. Grazing combined with stall feeding is the commonly used farming system. The major feed resources were natural pasture, crop residues, concentrates (wheat bran and linseed cake) and hay. Grasses are the major to cover the species composition of the natural pasture in both water logged and relatively drained pasture areas (57 and 83%, respectively) followed by sedges (37 and 10%, respectively). Barley and wheat straws are the major crop residues (53.81 and 27.94%, respectively). Majority of the feed available in the study area was originated from the natural pasture (56.39%) followed by crop residues (29.24%) and concentrates (5.06%). The total amount of DM estimated per household in the study area was 1.34 tons per TLU and this satisfied only 58.77% of the maintenance requirement. The nutrient content of
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natural pasture in this study was 31.85 and 32.65% DM, 9.28 and 8.65% CP, 10.51 and 10.46 MJ/kg DM of ME, 0.29 and 0.33% Ca, and 0.19 and 0.23% P for water logged and relatively drained areas, respectively. Crop residues had DM, CP, ME, Ca, and P contents of 91.06-95.25%, 4.10-7.24%, 9.66-10.57 MJ/kg DM, 0.15-0.49% and 0.07-0.13%, respectively. The nutrient contents of linseed cake and wheat bran was 93.17 and 94.17% DM, 31.96 and 17.0.2% CP, 12.17 and 14.67 MJ/kg DM of ME, 0.34 and 0.09% Ca and 0.97% P each, respectively. Hay had DM content of 92.47%, CP content of 6.67%, ME content of 9.43MJ/kg DM, Ca content of 0.36% and P content of 0.22%. The mean total land holding was 6.67ha (SE=0.28) per household. The average size of tenured land was (5.46 ha) while the rest (1.21 ha) was contracted land. On average each household supplied a total of 108.62 MJ/kg DM, 1150.65 (g) of CP, 28.69 (g) of Ca and 38.88 (g) of P for a lactating cow. Much of ME (48.59%) and Ca (42.72%) originated from crop residues followed by Concentrates ME (37.16%) and Ca (16.66%) but much of P originated from concentrates (76.90%). The average peak daily milk yield for crossbred cows was 6.83 liters and for indigenous was 2.82 liters. The lactation length was 10.3 and 7.49 months for crossbred and indigenous cows, respectively. Age at first calving was 36.02 and 46.77 months and the calving interval were 19.90 and 23.53 months for crossbred and indigenous cows, and service per conception of 2.19 and 1.6 times were found for crossbred and indigenous cows, respectively. Conclusions were made on the feed resources and their nutrient composition in the study areas and appropriate recommendations were forwarded.
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chemical composition, dairy, Ethiopia, feed resources, feeding systems, nutrient content