Question

Name five considerations used to physically evaluate a forage to be used for livestock nutrition.

Answer 1

Answer : The consideration which are kept in the mind for the evaluation of quality of forage used for Livestock nutrition are

1. Colour: The colour is the first evaluation criteria. The colour used here as nutrition must be green not brown. Colouring of hay depends on the age of forage so it must be in younger stage so that the nutrition is not lost.

2. Size:The size of stem and leaves used as forage is also very important factor. Larger size hay means it is getting brown so they loose there nutritious value as here the protein and energy content is lost so again selection of new and younger stage is better option due to high chlorophyll content.

3.Presence of weed in hay: Presence of seed heads is not good sign for high nutritious quality. So weed if found in seed head form then it should not be used as forage.

4.Density/ weight of bundle: If we compair the bundle of hay of same size then they look similar in visual sense but when we weight it the density wise they differ. The good quality forage will be lighter in comparison to the bad quality which is heavier as it contains lot of weeds, seed heads, hard stem and leaf which is responsible for higher density.

5.Presence of molds: Sometimes the hay get very dark brown as it form the net like matted structure so when we see the lower part of it powdery white power can be seen which is mold and this is not good for feeding. But animals attract to this type of forage due to the special smell of it( tobacco like smell). But it is poor quality.

These are  five considerations used to evaluate a forage to be used for livestock nutrition.