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Digestibility of nutrients of male Dorper sheep weaned at different ages

Norhayati Zaini*¹, Shanmugavelu Sithambaram² and Wan Zahari Mohamed³

¹Malaysian Agricultural Research and Development Institute, Kota Kinabalu, Sabah
²Formerly Malaysian Agricultural Research and Development Institute, Serdang, Selangor
³Formerly Universiti Malaysia Kelantan, City Campus, 16100 Pengkalan Chepa, Kota Bharu, Kelantan

Malaysian J. Anim. Sci. 2020 23(1): 1-9

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The nutrient digestibility is an important aspect to measure the feed efficiency of feed given to the animals. Therefore, this study was conducted to evaluate the nutrient digestibility of male Dorper sheep at different weaning ages. A total of 27 new-born Dorper lambs (average body weight, 3.06�0.74 kg) were randomly divided into three equal (n=9) experimental groups namely, Group 1, Group 2 and Group 3, weaned at day 30, 60 and 90, respectively. Creep feed (ME, 12 MJ/kg and CP, 18%) and grower feeds (ME, 10 MJ/kg and CP, 14%) were fed at 3.5% of their mean body weight before and after weaning, respectively. Digestibility trials for Group 1, 2 and 3 were conducted 10 d before the animals reached 30, 60 and 90 d of age, respectively. The digestibility trial was repeated at 10 d before the animal reached the age of 270 d. Three animals were selected from each group for digestibility trial and the animals were individually housed in metabolism cage. There was no significant (P>0.05) difference in digestibility of DM, CP, CF, EE and NFE among the treatment groups at pre-weaning and post-weaning stages. However, numerically weaning at 30 d of age was higher in nutrient digestibility at pre-weaning stage than weaning at 60 and 90 d of age. For post-weaning stage, all groups showed no significant difference in nutrient digestibility. As a conclusion, this study shows that the weaning age does not significantly influence the nutrient digestibility of male Dorper sheep.