The study of chemical composition and ruminal degradability parametersof urea treatment of wheat straw and sugarcane bagasse

The present study was conducted to evaluate the effect of urea treatment of wheat straw and sugarcane bagasse on chemical composition, lag time and ruminal degradability parameters of dry matter (DM) and neutral detergent fiber (NDF) by nylon bag technique. The chemical composition and degradability parameters of unprocessed samples and processed samples with five percent urea were determined using three mature rumen-fistulated Holstein dairy cows (with initial body weight of 615±15 kg and three lactation number). Urea treatment decreased DM and NDF degradation lag time of processed wheat straw (P<0.05); however it had no effect on DM and NDF degradation lag time of sugarcane bagasse. The urea treatment resulted to increase in DM and NDF degradability rate of processed wheat straw (P<0.05), but had no effect on DM and NDF degradability rate of sugarcane bagasse. The potentially degradable fraction of DM and پ NDF of both experimental materials were increased by treatment (P<0.05). The effective degradability of DM and NDF of experimental roughages increased (P<0.05) after urea treatment from 35.69 and 21.69 to 44.04 and 29.12 percent, respectively for wheat straw and from 18.88 and 15.65 to 23.92 and 19.52 percent, respectively for sugarcane bagasse. According to the results of this experiment, urea treatment of roughages-feeds, especially wheat straw improves degradability of DM and NDF.