Growth assessment of sheep fed with whey powder permeate

Abstract

The present work aimed to establish the biometric measures and the pre-slaughter weight, conversion and food efficiency of sheep fed with whey powder permeate. In order to do so, 24 male sheep, of Santa Inês breed, with a 20 kg body weight, fed with growing levels of whey powder permeate (0%, 5%, 10% and 15%), replacing ground maize in the concentrate. When reaching 30 kg of live weight, the animals were weighed to establish the live weight in the origin and the live weight at slaughter, and to get the morpho-structural measures. The analysis of regression was used for study the replacement levels, when significant differences were detected in the analysis of variance. The initial biometric measures did not differ among the animals which can help inferring that they all belong to a homogeneous group and do not characterize a variation source. There was no effect of the replacement of ground maize of the whey powder permeate diet on the development and the bioemtric measures of sheep. The inclusion of up to 15% of whey powder permeate to substitute maize, in diets for sheep in termination, does not harm the animals growth.