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Effect of forage legume supplementation of maize cobs on the performance of West African Dwarf sheep
| Slovak Journal of Animal Science
The supplementation of maize cobs with forage legumes was used to evaluate the performance of sixteen West African Dwarf sheep aged 10-15 months and average weight of 18.01 ± 0.30 kg in a complete randomized design. The basal diet of maize cob plus 100 g of palm kernel cake was offered alone (control) or supplemented with 200 g on dry matter basis of forages of Enterolobium cyclocarpum, Leucaena leucocephala and Gliricidia sepium, respectively. Data were taken on feed intake, body weight changes, feed conversion ratio, digestibility and haematological parameters. The result of the study showed that maize cobs supplemented with forage legume improved sheep performance with best (p<0.05) feed intake and weight gain observed in sheep supplemented with Leucaena (745 g.day-1 and 33.57 g.day-1, respectively) and Gliricidia forage (720 g.day-1 and 30.89 g.day-1, respectively) with best dry matter, crude protein and fibre digestibilities. Though, there were significant differences (P<0.05) observed in values of blood parameters with the exception of white blood cells, these values were within the normal range reported for healthy sheep production. It was therefore concluded that maize cobs supplementation with forage legumes can play an important role in improving the performance of sheep with the supplementation of Leucaena and Gliricidia forage producing the best performance.
