Economic assessment of use of pulses in diets for captive red deer

Received: February 6th, 2021 ; Accepted: April 24th, 2021 ; Published: April 29th, 2021 ; Correspondence:[email protected] quality of compound feeds used in livestock diets could be enhanced by means of domestically produced pulses. Nevertheless, there are available few research studies that would allow us to identify the economic efficiency of livestock diets with pulses and the digestibility of protein by livestock for deer farming. Accordingly, the present research aims to identify the economic efficiency of diets supplemented with domestically produced pulses - faba beans, peas and lupine beans - for captive deer. The research conducted a feeding experiment on captive deer (Cervus elaphus) kept in fenced areas to identify the economic efficiency of diets supplemented with three legume species: peas (variety ‘Vitra’), faba beans (variety ‘Fuego’) and narrow-leaved lupin seeds (variety ‘Boregine’). Deer productivity was assessed by live weight, live weight gain, feed intake and protein efficiency ratio during the experimental period, as well as feed cost per live weight gain unit. The research found that feeding deer diets containing peas, faba beans and lupine beans as protein-rich feedstuffs was economically advantageous - at the same cost of feed, deer productivity increased and per-unit production costs decreased. Live weight gains during the experimental period were 1.02% higher in group 2 (pea diet), 1.78% higher in group 3 (faba bean diet) and 2.91% higher in group 4 (lupine diet) than in the control group. During the experimental period, the highest protein efficiency ratio was found in group 4 fed a diet containing lupine beans - a unit of protein fed (1 kg) yielded the highest weight gain or 0.43 kg. Feed costs per kg of live weight gain were the lowest in group 4 (2.32 EUR kg-1 ), 2.48 EUR kg-1 in group 3 and 2.70 EUR kg-1 in group 2, which was 20.56%, 14.81% and 7.39%, respectively, lower than those in the control group

Legumes in the diet of dairy cows from the economic perspective

ArticleBased on the experimental data, one can conclude that feed rations may comprise peas var. ‘Bruno’ and faba beans var. ‘Lielplatone’ grown in Latvia, thereby replacing the use of imported soybean cake. After summarising the results of trials, one can conclude that the diets comprising only one kind of legumes (peas or beans) were the most economically efficient, while the highest production efficiency was achieved if incorporating 22–24% ‘Lielplatone’ faba beans into the diet for dairy cows. In Europe and Latvia, foods of animal origin comprise, on average, 45% of the total agricultural output value; an essential role in the production of the foods is played by the supply of protein-rich feedstuffs to the livestock industry. An analysis of the factors influencing productivity in dairy farming shows that a diet is the most important factor that promote or hinder the functioning of the inherited genetic potential. In order to meet the dietary energy, protein and mineral requirements of cows, the cows have to be fed a diet according to their physiological condition. In recent years in many countries, research investigations into protein sources have been conducted, as a high protein content of feedstuff is the most expensive component of a feed ration. For this reason, their use in livestock diets might be economically inefficient and therefore the key focus has to be placed on opportunities to increase the content of protein in domestically produced feeds

Effect of sapropel fertilizer on the quality of the yield of some field crops

Received: February 21st, 2023 ; Accepted: May 8th, 2023 ; Published: May 22nd, 2023 ; Correspondence: [email protected] is specific water body sediments containing a high level of organic matter formed from remains of water biota mixed with mineral components. One of the most promising utilisation ways of sapropel is agriculture where it can be used as soil amendment to improve soil physical properties and thus obtain economically viable and high quality yield of field crops. For three years the experiments were conducted at Priekuli Research Centre of the Institute of Agricultural Resources and Economics. Dehydrated sapropel mass from Lake Bizas was studied as soil biological fertilizer to determine its suitability for use in field crop production. Researches were carried out in organic crop rotation, in the fields of potato, winter rye and field bean. Three different doses of sapropel fertilizer were applied. During the three-year period (2020–2022), the yield indicators of the plant species included in the study were evaluated, and the quality of the yield of these species was assessed. The results of research confirm the positive effect of sapropel on yield quality indicators - protein (field beans), starch (potatoes) falling number and 1,000 seed mass (winter rye)

Gross margin comparison of cultivation of different legume species in the organic farming system

Received: February 7th, 2021 ; Accepted: April 10th, 2021 ; Published: April 29th, 2021 ; Correspondence: [email protected] order to identify the most suitable varieties for organic farming, the Institute of Agricultural Resources and Economics in 2018 started study four legume species. The independent variables of the study were the legume genotypes: faba bean (Vicia faba L., cv. ‘Isabell’, ‘Lielplatone’, ‘Laura’, ‘Boxer’), field pea (Pisum sativum L, cv. ‘Astronaute’, ‘Bruno’, ‘Rebekka’, ‘Zaiga’), narrow lupine (Lupinus angustifolius L., cv. ‘Sonet’, ‘Probor’, ‘Derliai’, ‘Haags Blau’), and soya (Glycine max L., cv. ‘Annucha’, ‘Sculptor’, ‘Augusta’). The soil types of the experimental organic field were sod–podzolic, sandy loam, and loamy sand. At the start of the study the organic substance concentration was 15–18 mg kg-1 , pHKCl was 5.3–5.98, the concentration of plant - available phosphorus (P205) was 133.2–182.9 mg kg-1 , and the concentration of potassium (K2O) - 69.2–109.7 mg kg-1 . Green manure (buckwheat) was a pre-crop, incorporated in autumn. For the comparison of economic indicators, the gross coverage calculation was used, which based on the difference obtained by subtracting variable costs from the valuation of gross output. All variable costs and revenues were included in the gross margin calculation without value added tax. The study indicated large differences in yields between genotypes. From the economic point of view, the most suitable cultivars for cultivation according to the organic farming method were: field beans - ‘Isabell’ and ‘Lielplatone’ with average gross cover (GC), 505.40 and 504.60 EUR, respectively, field peas - ‘Bruno’ (GC 379.60 EUR), narrow-leaved lupin - ‘Derliai’ (GC 647.70 EUR), soybeans - ‘Sculptor’ (GC 204.40 EUR). Among the legume species studied, lupine showed the highest economic performance, among the genotypes - cultivar ‘Derliai’ (α = 0.05)

Spatial correlations in attribute communities

Community detection is an important tool for exploring and classifying the properties of large complex networks and should be of great help for spatial networks. Indeed, in addition to their location, nodes in spatial networks can have attributes such as the language for individuals, or any other socio-economical feature that we would like to identify in communities. We discuss in this paper a crucial aspect which was not considered in previous studies which is the possible existence of correlations between space and attributes. Introducing a simple toy model in which both space and node attributes are considered, we discuss the effect of space-attribute correlations on the results of various community detection methods proposed for spatial networks in this paper and in previous studies. When space is irrelevant, our model is equivalent to the stochastic block model which has been shown to display a detectability-non detectability transition. In the regime where space dominates the link formation process, most methods can fail to recover the communities, an effect which is particularly marked when space-attributes correlations are strong. In this latter case, community detection methods which remove the spatial component of the network can miss a large part of the community structure and can lead to incorrect results.Comment: 10 pages and 7 figure

Identification of atrial fibrillation episodes using a camera as contactless sensor

Identification of paroxysmal atrial fibrillation (AF) can be difficult and undiagnosed AF patients are at high risk of cardioembolic stroke or other complications associated with AF. The aim of this study is to analyze the video photoplethysmografic (vPPG) signal obtained from a videocamera to explore the possibility of discriminating AF from normal sinus rhythm (NSR) and other arrhythmias (ARR). We acquired 24 3-min long face-videos (8 for each rhythm) using an industrial camera. After preprocessing, vPPG signal was extracted using zero-phase component analysis. Diastolic minima were detected and inter-diastolic series obtained. The signals were characterized by time domain indexes, the sample entropy (SampEn); and the shape similarity index (ShapeSim). The time domain indexes and ShapeSim are significantly different when comparing the group of patients with AF or ARR to subjects in NSR. SampEn is significantly higher in AF than in NSR and ARR. From the shape analysis, it can be noted that waves in NSR are more similar than in AF. These preliminary results show the capability of different indexes to capture differences among AF, ARR and NSR. Further studies will help in assessing the performance of the vPPG signal to screen general population

Inference of hidden structures in complex physical systems by multi-scale clustering

We survey the application of a relatively new branch of statistical physics--"community detection"-- to data mining. In particular, we focus on the diagnosis of materials and automated image segmentation. Community detection describes the quest of partitioning a complex system involving many elements into optimally decoupled subsets or communities of such elements. We review a multiresolution variant which is used to ascertain structures at different spatial and temporal scales. Significant patterns are obtained by examining the correlations between different independent solvers. Similar to other combinatorial optimization problems in the NP complexity class, community detection exhibits several phases. Typically, illuminating orders are revealed by choosing parameters that lead to extremal information theory correlations.Comment: 25 pages, 16 Figures; a review of earlier work

The rise of China in the international trade network: a community core detection approach

Theory of complex networks proved successful in the description of a variety of static networks ranging from biology to computer and social sciences and to economics and finance. Here we use network models to describe the evolution of a particular economic system, namely the International Trade Network (ITN). Previous studies often assume that globalization and regionalization in international trade are contradictory to each other. We re-examine the relationship between globalization and regionalization by viewing the international trade system as an interdependent complex network. We use the modularity optimization method to detect communities and community cores in the ITN during the years 1995-2011. We find rich dynamics over time both inter- and intra-communities. Most importantly, we have a multilevel description of the evolution where the global dynamics (i.e., communities disappear or reemerge) tend to be correlated with the regional dynamics (i.e., community core changes between community members). In particular, the Asia-Oceania community disappeared and reemerged over time along with a switch in leadership from Japan to China. Moreover, simulation results show that the global dynamics can be generated by a preferential attachment mechanism both inter- and intra- communities