Effect of fibre fractions of Ailanthus excelsa roxb. on in-vitro dry matter digestibility(IVDMD) and Metabolisable energy

Forages usually constitute the major portion of the ruminant feeds in our country. Availability of feed containing imbalanced chemical composition and metabolisable energy is major handicap in ruminant production the world over. The present study aimed to evaluate the fibre fractions of Ailanthus excels Roxb. fast growing multipurpose indigenous tree species used as cattle fodder as the leaves are rated as highly palatable and nourishing with high percentage of crude protein. The fiber fractions i.e. Neutral Detergent Fibre (NDF), Acid Detergent Fiber (ADF), Acid Detergent Lignin (ADL) values were measured for Ailanthus excels Roxb. leaves and observed that AD Fvaried from 0.91% to 74 %and the average was recorded as 48.93 ± 8.36 %, NDF ranged from 28.49 % to 94.77 % with an average of 5.6± 0.97 % and recorded the minimum of 0.2% to the maximum of 17.5 % of ADL value. Low or high NDF value indicate the dry matter digestibility and dry matter intake that will result in a decrease or increase in livestock consumption. Hemicellulose and cellulose, the slowly digestible fibre materials present in the cell wall ranged from 1.72 to 82.5 % and 0.45 to 96.72 % respectively. The digestibility of the A.excelsa leaves was tested for 24 hrs and 48 hrs were observed that almost all accessions showed digestibility greater than 50%.Metabolizable energy (ME) and Total Digestible Nutrients (TDN) are the other two energy requirement of cattle other than IVDMD and ME observed to be more than 8.23(MJ/Kg DM) for all the accessions and TDN value more than 40 %. Though fodder is nutrient treasure, the IVDMD decides the nutrient intake by the cattle. With the desirable fibre fraction and promising IVDMD and metabolizable energy values of A. excel accessions can be an alternate tree fodder for cattle during lean period.