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Comparative Response of Horses and Sheep to Different Physical Forms of Alfalfa Hay^1,2,

University of Delaware, Newark and U. S. Department of Agriculture

Abstract

Comparative responses of six horses and six sheep to three different physical forms of hay (loose, wafered and pelleted) were studied. While the three hay rations were similar in chemical composition, they differed significantly in density and in mean particle size. Horses consumed 17% more wafers and 24% more pellets than loose hay. Sheep ate 9% more wafers and 73% more pellets than loose hay. Horses displayed greater activity in trying to slice wafers into bite size before chewing than did sheep. Wood chewing was observed as the only undesirable side effect when pellets were fed to horses, while sheep showed a harmless type of bloating.

Horses did not differ significantly in their digestion of the three physical forms of hay except for crude fiber, which was less digestible in pellets than in loose hay. Sheep showed significant depressions in the digestion of dry matter, organic matter, crude protein, crude fiber and N-free extract, when pellets were fed as compared with loose hay. Intermediate values were obtained for wafers. Body weight gains of horses fed the three forms of hay were not significantly different. The nutritive value indices for pellets, wafers and loose hay were 57, 59 and 44 when fed to horses and 45, 30 and 32, respectively, when fed to sheep. Physical form of the hay rations affected their nutritive values in ruminants and in horses.

¹ Department of Animal Science and Agricultural Biochemistry. Published as Miscellaneous Paper No. 501 of the Delaware Agricultural Experiment Station, with approval of the Director

² The assistance of Mrs. E. R. Haenlein, C. Zeitler, C. D. Passmore and W. H. Mitchell is gratefully acknowledged.

³ Agricultural Engineering Research Division, ARS, U.S.D.A., Beltsville, Maryland.

⁴ Present address: Air Reduction Chemical and Carbide Company, Bound Brook Laboratories, Bound Brook, New Jersey.