Animal Digestibility Study

In the realm of animal nutrition we often find ourselves talking about this feed or that feed and the nutrient content of the available feeds. The nutrients are mainly proteins, lipids, and carbohydrates but generally also include vitamins and minerals present in the feedstuff. These are precisely measured and accounted for in each animal’s diet based off of their present dietary needs. There is often one aspect of animal feeds and nutrition that non-nutritionists looking into this work often forget. That is the digestibility of the feed. Not every feed is entirely digestible due to intrinsic properties of the feed, outside forces affecting the feed such as contamination events, and the natural gastrointestinal structure of the animal being …show more content…
In the monogastric this would be toxic and lower the overall digestibility of the feed because the gastrointestinal tract of that animal is unable to metabolize any usable protein from that nitrogen source. On the other hand, the bacteria in the rumen of a ruminant is able to convert this non-protein nitrogen source into a usable protein source such as microbial protein. In the case of proteins, the level of digestibility of the feed can affect the net protein value, the NPV, which is a measurement of the growth efficiency of a protein measured in nitrogen uptake of a group of animals fed the protein versus a group of similar animals not fed that test …show more content…
Certain carbohydrates found in the feed will affect the digestibility of the feeds. Additionally, monogastric animals are still far more effected by the digestibility of the feed than ruminants are. Ruminants are able to digest the carbohydrates hemicellulose and cellulose where as monogastric animals simply are not able to. This is, once again, due to the presence of microorganisms in the rumen that are able to digest those carbohydrates and convert them into the volatile fatty acids, VFAs, the ruminant actually uses for energy. There is one carbohydrate, though, that both the monogastric animals and the ruminants are unable to digest. This carbohydrate would be lignin, a natural carbohydrate found in the stems and stalks of aging plants. The presence of lignin in the forage feed increases with the age of the plant and decreases the digestibility of the feed and therefore decreases the feeding value as well. Lignin is almost entirely indigestible and forms complexes that even block the enzymes that digest hemicellulos and cellulose. Because of the presence of lignin in more mature plants, farmers have now developed practices that allow them to graze their fields while they are in their younger stages and far more