The objective of the experiment was to determine the proportion of coconut meat waste (CMW) utilization replacing maize in feed supplements on feed consumption, nutrient digestibility and weight gain of beef cattle. Four male Charolais crossbred cattle (363±14.1 kg) were used in Latin square design (4x4) on 4 periods (3 weeks/period). The treatment replaced maize with coconut meat waste 0, 25, 50 and 75% (CMW0, CMW25, CMW50 and CMW75, respectively). The result showed that the dry matter (DM) intake tended to decrease (P>0.05) from CMW0 to CMW75. In detail, the DM per body weight was 1.64, 1.65, 1.50 and 1.47% corresponding to CMW0, CMW25, CMW50 and CMW75 treatments. The neutral detergent fiber consumption tended to increase (P>0.05) from CMW0 (2.97 kg) to CMW75 treatments (3.22 kg). However, the metabolism energy of CMW25 was higher than (P>0.05) CMW0, CMW50 and CMW75 (57.9, 54.7, 52.7 and 52.2 MJ/animal/day, respectively). Both DM and OM digestibility were not significantly different in this study but CP and NDF were otherwise. The CMW0 treatment was lower than (P<0.05) the CMW75 treatment for CP digestibility (71.5 & 75.6%) and NDF digestibility (54.5 & 64.3%). The weight gain of cattle was 576, 584, 537 and 459 g/animal/day (CMW0, CMW25, CMW50 and CMW75, respectively). It is concluded that 25% of coconut meat waste changes maize in the diet of fattening Charolais crossbred cattle to improved feed, nutrient intake, nutrient digestibility and daily weight gain.
Keywords | Supplement, Rumen, Ruminants, Waste, Energy feed, Crossbred cattle