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Effects of Pre-Conditioning on Voluntary Intake Assay Results Using Sheep^{1, 2,}

Canada Department of Agriculture, Ottawa, Canada

Abstract

The effects of the prior nutritional experience of lambs on their voluntary consumption of several forages was studied. There were no differences between intakes of lambs fed a silage for the first time compared with intakes of lambs which had been previously fed the same silage followed by 3 weeks of hay feeding. When two silages were interchanged in a similar fashion, however, interactions between silage intake and previous nutritional experience occurred. Only transitory differences were noted between forage intakes of lambs reared on slatted floors and allowed access only to their mother's milk and pelleted hay and the intake of lambs exposed to a more varied nutritional environment from having been reared with their dams on pasture.

We conclude that standardization of previous feeding experience is not generally necessary to carry out meaningful voluntary forage consumption assays, with the precaution that silages of the type employed in this study should not be measured consecutively.

¹ Contribution No. 445, Animal Research Institute, Research Branch, Canada Department of Agriculture, Ottawa, Canada.

² Appreciation is expressed to W. A. Emond and the Large Animal Laboratory staff for care and feeding of the sheep and to J. C. Love for technical assistance in tabulation of the data and calculations.