1Department of Agronomy, Kansas State University, Manhattan-KS, USA.
ICAR-National Dairy Research Institute, Karnal-132 001, Haryana, India.
*Corresponding Author: Rakesh Kumar, ICAR-National Dairy Research Institute, Karnal-132 001, Haryana, India, Email: drdudi_rk@rediffmail.com
Online Published on 02 September, 2022.
The improvement in livestock productivity may be possible by availing better quality fodder in adequate quantity to the dairy farmers. Zinc deficiency might be a major factor for lower quality fodder of cowpea.
The experiment was laid out in factorial randomized block design; comprised of three cowpea cultivars viz., C-152, MFC 08–14 and MFC-09-1 and five zinc management practices viz., control; 10 kg ZnSO4 as basal; 20 kg ZnSO4 as basal; 0.5% ZnSO4 as foliar spray at 20 DAS; 0.5% ZnSO4 as foliar spray at 20 and 40 DAS.
Results revealed that C-152 showed significantly better quality in terms of higher dry matter, crude protein and total ash and lower acid insoluble ash, neutral detergent fibre, acid detergent fibre and acid detergent lignin amongst all the three varieties. Though, remarkably higher ether extract was obtained with MFC-08-14. Among the zinc management practices, 20 kg ZnSO4 as basal (Zn3) and foliar application of 0.5% ZnSO4 at 20 and 40 DAS (Zn5) recorded significant improvement in fodder yield and quality traits of cowpea.
Cowpea, Fodder quality, Total digestible nutrients, Zinc
