AN ORAL FEED STRATEGY IN SHEEP FOR IMPROVED DIGESTIBILITY, NUTRIENT UTILIZATION AND METHANE MITIGATION

Objective: A trial was conducted to study the efficacy of herbal formulation Ruchamax (M/S Ayurvet Limited, India) on digestibility and nutrient utilization in Deccani sheep.Methods: 12 growing healthy Deccani sheep (5-6 months) were randomly divided into 2 groups. Control Group I (T0) was not given any treatment. Group II (T­1) supplemented with Ruchamax (appetite stimulant and digestive tonic). The test herbal formulation was mixed in the concentrate feed as per the recommendations. Parameters like body weight, plasma cortisol level, blood enzyme estimation, feed analysis, nitrogen balance, methane estimation and carcass quality traits were studied.Results: Statistically (P<0.05) Ruchamax supplemented group had significantly superior average daily gain (g) than that of control. DMI, Dry matter digestibility and FCR of Ruchamax supplemented group were significantly (P<0.05) improved. The maximum nitrogen balance was obtained in Ruchamax supplemented group T1. Significantly (P<0.05) lower level of cortisol in Ruchamax supplemented animals confirmed the increased resilience of animal towards stress. The Ruchamax supplemented group T1 emitted significantly less methane as compared to control group T0. Animals belonging to Ruchamax supplemented group T1 had significantly higher dressing % as compared to control group T0. The enzymatic values in both groups were under normal physiological level.Conclusion: The herbal appetite stimulant and digestive tonic Ruchamax was found to be safe for usage and efficient to improve digestibility, nutrient utility, performance traits in sheep alongwith added benefit of its methane mitigating potential.Â

Assessment of ground water quality in an industrial agglomeration of Visakhapatnam, A. P

ABSTRACT Ground water is increasingly used for domestic, agricultural, industrial and other activities. Quality of water is the most important factor for any use; be it domestic or any other purposes. Indiscriminate use of ground water deteriorates the quality and quantity of water. The present work reports the physico-chemical characteristics of the ground waters collected from an industrialized urban agglomeration of Visakhapatnam city, Andhra Pradesh. The physicochemical parameters include pH, Turbidity, Conductivity, Total Dissolved Solids, Chlorides, Sulphates, Total Hardness, Calcium, Magnesium, Total Alkalinity, Nitrates and Fluorides. Though the data show that majority of the values are compatible with the maximum allowable standards recommended by BIS, still in depth studies are to be carried out to decide its suitability for safe drinking and domestic use. It is possible that the concentration of the dissolved impurities may increase further if the recommended norms for discharging industrial effluents are not adhered

Sweet Sorghum: A Smart Crop to Meet the Demands of Food, Fodder, Fuel and Feed

At present, energy demand for transport in India is primarily met through non-renewable energy sources like fossil fuels. Being short in domestic production, India mainly depends on crude oil imports. In the near future oil imports are slated to rise further with no major breakthrough in domestic oil production. A compounding factor is the rise in the number of vehicles on the road, which has grown by 10 % each year between 2001 and 2006, and is expected to rise further. Against this backdrop, there is a renewed interest in energy augmentation through biofuel crops to meet the energy demand in the country. One such promising biofuel crop is sweet sorghum, whose sugar-rich stocks can be crushed to produce juice, then fermented into bio-ethanol, and used to make a blended fuel replacing conventional gasoline (Reddy et al. 2005). Sweet sorghum is a C4 plant with high photosynthetic efficiency. It produces a high biomass (up to 40-50 t ha-1) in a short time (4 months) under rain-fed conditions (Reddy, et al., 2005). One advantage of sweet sorghum compared to other crops is that using sweet sorghum for fuel does not reduce its contribution as food because the grain can be harvested for food, and the bagasse (the fiber left over after extraction of juice from sweet sorghum) that remains after the extraction of juice used for biofuel may be used for fodder (Nalini Kumari et al. 2011). Hence, sweet sorghum is a “smart” crop, which meets the triple requirements of food, fuel and fodde

Cluster analysis studies in rice (Oryza sativa L.) using wards minimum variance method

Abstract. The nature and magnitude of genetic divergence was estimated in one hundred and fourteen F 5 families of rice obtained from six different crosses along with their seven parents using ward's minimum divergence method by considering 10 characters. Results revealed existence of considerable amount of diversity in the material. The genotypes were grouped into twelve clusters. Cluster V constituted maximum number of genotypes (27). The genotypes falling in cluster XII had the maximum divergence (123.339), which was closely followed by cluster IX (112.928). The maximum inter cluster Euclidean 2 values was observed between cluster II and XII (1882.852) followed by cluster IX and XII (1488.520) suggesting that the genotypes constituted in these clusters may be used as parents for future hybridization programme

On-farm Evaluation of Elite Sweet Sorghum Genotypes for Grain and Stover Yields and Fodder Quality

Sweet sorghum is a multipurpose crop that comes up well under rainfed conditions in semi-arid tropics. While the stalk juice from sweet sorghum used for ethanol production, its grain is used for food and the bagasse as animal feed. The investigation had four objectives: 1) to popularize sweet sorghum as food, feed and fuel crop; 2) to identify promising sweet sorghum cultivars under on-farm conditions for use as animal feed; 3) to study the associationships between cane yield and stalk sugar traits; and 4) to assess the options for utilizing stover and fresh/dried bagasse as livestock feed. Sweet sorghum cultivation is feasible and profitable under rainfed conditions in the study area with the hybrid CSH 22 SS. Results from on-farm evaluation of elite sweet sorghum hybrids and varieties and correlation studies indicated that dryland farmers gain from whole plant use of sweet sorghum as there is no significant tradeoff between grain yield and sugar/stover yields. The genetic enhancement of sweet sorghum is justifiable as the food and fodder value of the crop is not compromised by its improvement for bio-fuel value. The effective rumen degradable dry matter (ERDDM) for sweet sorghum bagasse (SSB) was 40.60 per cent and effective rumen degradable protein (ERDP) value was 55.30 per cent. The nutritive value of SSB in terms of the digestible crude protein (DCP) and total digestible nutrients (TDN) in sheep was 1.02, 50.67 per cent where as in buffaloes DCP was 0.98 and TDN 51.78 percent. Results from the limited on-farm animal experiments in milch buffaloes and sheep indicate that the potential of sweet sorghum stalks in the form of stover and bagasse in fresh or ensiled form as a source of roughage is good and further long term experiments are required to confirm the sam