Banana crop residues can effectively be used as an energy source for our cattle and this practice can partly mitigate the chronic feed shortage of livestock especially in banana growing areas. Banana foliage is available in large amounts in the wet season and for effective utilization of this foliage for a longer period, it must be preserved immediately after harvest. For this reason, research was initially established to produce silage as the most feasible process for preservation and then its use as cattle feed. The purpose of this experiment was to obtain the information on biomass yield, chemical composition, nutritive value and voluntary intake of banana silage.
The whole mature banana plants were chopped and preserved with molasses and straw. The fresh and chopped banana plants were compared with that of the ensiled materials by feeding them to mature bulls. Sixteen young bulls of approximately 3 years of age and weighing about 370 kg were used. The bulls were divided into 4 groups and randomly allocated to the experimental diets e.g., T,= banana pseudostem ensiled with 5% molasses (BEM), T2= banana pseudostem ensiled with 5% molasses and 10% straw (BEMS), T,= Chopped fresh banana pseudostem with 5% molasses (FBM), and T,= Urea (3%)-molasses (15%)-straw (82%) (UMS). All diets were enriched with 3% urea during the time of feeding. Roughage was offered ad libitum throughout the day. Animals were not given any concentrate mixture. All animals received 60 g/d of mineral supplement including sodium sulfate and dicalcium phosphate.
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