Comparative performance and digestibility of nutrients in Afshari and Ghezel ram lambs

Abstract

This study was investigated to comparative performance and digestibility of nutrients in Afshari and Ghezel ram lambs. In the first trial 30 animals at the age of 5 month (15 Afshari (AF) and 15 Ghezel (GH) ram lambs were randomly allocated to individual pen, in order to determined fattening performance for a period of 90 days. In  the second trial 10 animals at the age of 10 month from each ecotype were  randomly  allocated in individual metabolic cages to determine the in vivo digestibility for 8 days after adaptation period. Data were analyzed in a complete randomized design using the GLM of SAS and the means were compared with Duncan’s multiple range test. The results showed that there were no significant effect in initial body weight, daily gain, feed conversion ratio and feed efficiency between treatments. Ghezel ram lambs had lower feed intake compared to Afshari ram lambs. The study showed that there were no significant differences for digestibility of DM, protein, EE, ADF, NDF and P, Ca, Mg, Fe and Cu between treatments. In conclusion the results showed that GH had no significance effect on feed digestibility and fattening characteristics of cross breed lambs.