Growth and nutrient utilization in stall-fed kids on Cumbu Napier Hybrid CO-4 silage and different levels of concentrate feed

An experiment was conducted for 120 days on local kids (3–4 months-old weighing 11–12 kg) by feeding Cumbu Napier hybrid (CO-4) grass silage ad libitum and supplementing concentrate mixture @ 0.5% body weight (R-I), CO-4 fodder silage ad libitum + concentrate mixture @ 1.0% body weight (R-II) and CO-4 fodder silage ad libitum + concentrate mixture @ 1.5% body weight (R-III) to study the growth and nutrient utilization. Average daily gain (ADG) was significantly (P<0.01) higher in kids fed R-III followed by R-II and R-I rations (58.14% higher gain in R-III than R-I and 31.38% higher in R-II than R-I). Compared to R-I ration, digestibility of crude protein (CP), ether extract (EE) and crude fibre (CF) increased (P<0.01) by 10.6, 8.27 and 5.70%, respectively in R-III ration and 7.60, 10.76 and 5.00%, respectively in R-II ration. Nitrogen free extract (NFE) digestibility was lower (P<0.01) by 7.48 and 9.93% in R-I than R-III and R-II ration, respectively. The study revealed that CO-4 fodder silage can be supplemented with concentrate at 1.5% of body weight for better growth and nutrient utilisation in native stall-fed kids.