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Comparative Studies on Digestive Efficiency and Urea Kinetic Between Goat and Sheep
Thesis Abstract:
The digestive efficiency and urea kinetics between Malaysian indigenous goats and sheep fed with rice straw+ soybean meal (SSB) and rice straw + soybean meal + sago (SSG) were compared. The dry matter (OM), nitrogen (N), organic matter (OM), and energy (E) intakes of goats and sheep were similar when fed with SSB diet. Higher OM intake was observed in goats on SSG diets. There were no significant differences in N, OM, and E intakes of goats and sheep.
Goats on SSB diet digested acid detergent fiber significantly better than sheep, but sheep showed higher digestibility for crude protein (CP), OM, and E. When on SSG diet, goat and sheep digestibility values for E were significantly different.
Goats showed greater potential degradability of OM and neutral detergent fiber of straw when fed with SSB diets. However, goats showed lower N potential degradability of soybean meal.
Studies in rumen fluid parameters showed that ammonia concentration was higher in sheep (382.89 ± 33.76 mg N/1) than in goats (363.24 ± 43.42 mg N/1), while pH and total volatile fatty acid (VFA) concentrations were similar between the two species when fed with SSB diet. The molar proportion of acetate in goats was higher(79.13 ±2.95%) than that in sheep (75 .84 ± 3.91%), but the reverse was true for molar proportion of propionate where the values obtained for sheep and goats were 15.57 ± 2.40 percent and 17.96 ± 2.72 percent, respectively. No significant differences for molar proportion of butyrate in goats and sheep were observed.
Results showed that there were higher ammonia concentration and higher acetate proportion in goats. Butyrate proportion, however, was higher in sheep. Between sheep and goat, there were no significant differences in the dilution rate constant, rumen volume, pool size of small particles (based on body weight), and mean retention time of both liquids and solids.
Results further showed the bacterial population in sheep rumen to be higher than in goats, but the protozoal population in goats and sheep were similar in both SSB and SSG diets. Sheep and goats showed similar concentration of plasma urea N, urea N synthesis rate, urea N degradation rate, function of urea C from blood to the rumen, and urea excretion in the urine.
Generally, results indicated differences in digestion between goats and sheep. However, results in rumen fermentation, solid and liquid flow rate, and urea metabolism could not fully explain why differences between the two ruminant species exist.