School of Agriculture, Food and Ecosystem Sciences - Theses

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Subject: Feeding and feeds × Author: Agar, William Alexander Ross ×

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    Studies on formaldehyde treated diets for lambs
    Agar, William Alexander Ross ( 1972)
    In the first section of this thesis the literature relating to the uses of protected proteins fed to ruminants is reviewed. The second section describes an investigation into the effect of formaldehyde treatment of concentrate diets for lambs. The diets consisted essentially of wheat alone and wheat plus 10% linseed meal or 10% rapeseed meal, containing 11.2, 13.7 and 13.8% crude protein respectively. These were fed to 20 kg Corriedale lambs under feedlot conditions. The growth rates of the lambs fed the treated diets were higher than those fed the untreated diets in all cases, but the differences were not statistically significant. Feed intakes were highest with the diets containing linseed meal (P< 0.0 5) . The wool growth rates of lambs fed the treated diets were higher than those fed the untreated diets, but the difference was significant only in the case of the wheat diet (PC 0.05). Increasing the level of the protein meals in the diets to 20; (about 15.8% CP) resulted in increased rates of weight gain with the untreated diets but decreased weight gains and feed intakes in the case of the treated diets. At the higher protein level the feed intakes and growth rates of lambs fed the untreated linseed meal diet were greater (P< 0.05) than those of the lambs on the treated linseed meal diet. No other differences between treated and untreated diets were significant. Investigation into methods of applying formalin to hammermilled wheat showed that neither the dilution of the applied formalin nor the air temperature at the time of application had any marked effect on the amount of formaldehyde bound. The use of unsealed containers for storage of the wheat immediately after treatment caused a reduction in the amount of formaldehyde bound. Pelleting of treated wheat stored for two weeks in sealed plastic bags did not result in losses of bound formaldehyde, but considerable losses occurred when the pelleted material was subsequently stored in hessian bags for a further ten weeks.