Nutritional evaluation of weeds as livestock feed

Agricultural weeds comprising of 18 grasses and 22 non grasses used as green fodder in Tripura were identified and evaluated for their nutritional worth for ruminants. The DM content averaged 23.27±1.61 and 17.49±1.15% in grasses and non-grasses, respectively. The mean values for CP, EE, CF, NFE and total ash were observed to be 8.84, 1.31, 28.34, 49.56 and 11.96%, respectively for grass species with the corresponding values of 15.30, 2.35, 17.62, 50.97 and 13.76% for non-grasses. The mean values for NDF, ADF, hemicellulose, cellulose and ADL were 69.95 and 46.77, 36.35 and 30.58, 33.60 and 16.19, 26.57 and 17.55 and 4.15 and 6.70% for grasses and non-grasses, respectively. In general, grasses contained low level of CP but higher level of fibre fractions as compared to non-grasses. IVDMD and IVOMD values ranged from 37.62/38.93 (S. spontaneum) to 55.61/57.62% (C. beghalensis) with an average of 48.12±1.27/50.00±1.31% in grasses and from 40.23/42.68 (P. minima) to 60.56/62.52% (M. cordata) averaging 48.87±1.22/51.12±1.24 in case of non-grasses. More than 50% of the weed species showed DM/OM digestibility values above 50%. The concentration of ME averaged 7.11 and 7.34 MJ/kg DM in grasses and non-grasses, respectively. IVDMD, IVOMD and ME values showed positive correlation with CP content, however, negatively correlated (P<0.01) with CF, NDF and ADF. The correlation of ME with IVDMD and IVOMD was highly positive. It seems that depending on the vegetative cover, weed species particularly C. benghalensis, P. conjugation, E. colonum, E. indica, M. cordata and S. paniculata could make maintenance ration or even ration for low yielders.