Corn Silage Quality in Vojvodina Province in Two Seasons
Keywords:
corn silage, forage quality, fiberAbstract
Corn is one of main crops in Serbia’s northern province of Vojvodina, and one of most important export products of Serbia. While majority of corn is used for grain production, lesser part is harvested for whole crop silage and used predominantly for cattle feeding. Irrigation is not widespread practice (”dry farming”) and corn silage yield and quality are under strong influence of season specific factors. Data on nutritional quality of corn silage samples from two seasons were obtained from Laboratory for quality control of feed and animal products of Department of Animal Science in Novi Sad, and used for comparison. Total of 80 samples were used. Corn silage samples from two seasons differed significantly in majority of analyzed parameters (crude fiber, crude fat, NDF, ADF and ADL) and observed differences can be attributed to different grain yield in two seasons. Corn silage samples from season with higher grain yield had significantly more fat, significantly less fiber (crude, NDF, ADF, ADL) and almost significantly (p=0,05) less crude protein. Differences in levels of dry matter and crude ash were not observed.
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