A Rapid Technique for Determination of Total Disappearance of Dietary Nitrogen in the Digestive Tract Using Washed Fecal Sample after Freezing and Thawing

Abstract

Three Holstein steers, fitted with ruminal and duodenal cannulas, were used in a replicated 3 X 3 Latin square design to the digestibility of dietary nitrogen in total digestive tract by three methods, 1) mobile nylon bag (MNB); 2) total fecal collection (TFC); and 3) washed fecal sample after freezing and thawing through a sieve with a pore size of 45 μm (WFS). A basal diet of oaten hay-barley was supplemented with one of the following protein sources; soybean meal, fish meal or blood meal. Steers were fed at a level of 2% of body weieht. The experimental diets were contained approximately 1.85% nitrogen. There were no differences (p>0.05) among the diets on DM, NDF and nitrogen disappearances, and the diet results were pooled to assess the methods. Total tract disappearances of dry matter and neutral detergent fiber were 61.6, 71.1 and 78.9 and 25.3, 63.2 and 64.6 for MNB, TFC and WFS methods, respectively. The lower digestibility ot DM and NDF in the MNB method could be a result of low ruminal incubation time. The TFC method had the lower (p<0.05) determination of nitrogen disappearance in the total digestive tract than the MNB and WFS methods. On the other hand, nitrogen disappearance in the total digestive tract determined by the WFS technique was comparable to that in MNB technique, as there was no significant difference (p>0.05) between the methods. It is shown that the disappearance of dietary nitrogen in the total digestive tract could be estimated in the intact animals by using washed fecal sample prior to freezing and thawing.