Effect of supplementation of dried yeast (Nutramix - Mdy) on growth performance of pre- ruminant calves

Abstract

An experiment was conducted to study the effect of dietary supplementation of dried yeast (''Neutramix-MDY'') on growth performance of pre-ruminant calves. Twelve calves of one week to one month of age were distributed into two groups of six calves each, as uniformly as possible with regard to age, sex and body weight, with one group receiving the control diet (calf starter, grass and milk) and the other group receiving dried yeast ("Neutramix-MDY") @ 20g/day along with the control diet. The final body weight (kg) and average daily gain (g/day) were 72.5 and 247 for control group and 76.2 and 284 for treatment group during the trial period. Though there was no statistically significant difference between the control and the treatment group, there was a numerical increase in both the parameters in treatment animals. The average feed to gain ratio was 4.94 and 4.60 for the control and treatment group respectively. There was no improvement in dry matter, crude protein, acid detergent fibre and neutral detergent fibre digestibilities in yeast fed group over the control. Haematological parameters such as blood glucose, plasma protein, calcium and phosphorus were unaffected by the dietary treatment. The above results indicate that supplementation of yeast culture to the diets of pre- ruminant calves had no statistically significant effect on animal performance.