Nutritive value of some important indigenous livestock browse species in semi-arid mixed Mopane bushveld, Botswana

摘要

Theutilizationofnaturalbrowseasqualitylivestockfeedduringthelatedryseasoncanalleviatenutritionaldeficienciesandmaintainlivestockproduction,particularlyinaridandsemi-aridenvironments.ThisstudyinvestigatedthenutritionalvalueofbrowsespeciesineasternBotswana.Samplesoffreshgreenleaves,oldleavesfromthepreviousyear#8217;sgrowthaswellastherarely-utilizedbarkswerecollectedfromatotalof16browsespeciesduringthelatedryseason(SeptemberandOctober).Podswereunavailableandthuswerenotsampled.nbsp;Thehighestcrudeproteincontentwasobservedinfreshleaves,followedbyoldleavesandlastlybarkswithrangesof6.08-23.9%,6.09-13.4%and4.62-11.5%respectively.Crudefiberwashighestinbarkswithanaverageof35.75%,followedbyoldleaveswith29.1%andfreshleaveswith27.8%.Invitrodigestibilityaveraged63.2%foroldleaves,61.8%forfreshleavesand57.1%forbarks.Mineralcontentofthebrowsespeciesalsovariedaccordingtotheplantpartsampled.Overall,theseresultsindicatethatbrowsespecieshavehighnutritionalvalueshencecanbeusedassourcesoffeedsforlivestocktoimprovelivestockproduction,whilelowphosphorusvaluescanbecorrectedthroughphosphorussupplementationespeciallyduringthelatedryseason.