Supply of water with salinity levels for Morada Nova sheep
Introduction
Potable water scarcity for human and animal consumption is one of the main problems for the survival and development of rural populations in semi-arid regions, where a large number of small ruminants are reared. Such a hurdle is intrinsically related to low precipitation and irregular rainfall in these areas, besides unfavorable geological structures for subsoil water accumulations, which is the largest source of available water (Iñiguez, 2011).
In spite of the great importance of water in animal production, this issue does not receive its deserved attention in the technical-scientific field. Plumb (1927) also addressed this topic and pointed out its poor exploitation in sheep farming systems. Little investigation has been made of water as a response-variable or introducing this natural resource as the focus of a study (Schlink et al., 2010).
Given the above background, this study was conducted to evaluate the productive performance and nutritional state of Morada Nova sheep supplied with water at different levels of total dissolved solids.
Section snippets
Study site description
The experiment was carried out at an experimental field in the Animal Metabolism Unit of Embrapa Semiárido. This area is located in the Caatinga biome, in the city of Petrolina - PE, Brazil. The average annual rainfall is 570 mm, and average values of maximum and minimum annual temperatures are 33.8 and 21.5 °C, respectively. Before being carried out, the study was evaluated and approved by the Committee on Ethics and Deontology in Studies and Research of the Federal University of Vale do São
Results
The average intake of nutritional fractions (kg/day) of diets was not significantly affected (P > 0.05) by water salinity levels (Table 2).
No differences were observed in the performance of Morada Nova sheep consuming water with TDS levels up to 8320 mg/L (Table 2), which had an average daily weight gain of 151.29 g. The lowest weight gain (144.84 g/day) was obtained by lambs served water containing 8320 mg/L TDS.
There was no significant difference in feed conversion, total water intake, and
Discussion
Nutrient intake is one of the main factors in animal production efficiency. The dry matter intake of lambs was higher than the 0.70 kg/animal/day suggested by the National Research Council - NRC (2007) for late-developing animals with a body weight of 20 kg and for a weight gain of 200 g/day, demonstrating that the increasing TDS levels in water had no effect on sheep DM intake (Table 2).
Dry matter intake is an important factor in the performance of feedlot sheep, being considered determinant
Conclusions
Increasing levels of total dissolved solids in water up to 8320 mg/L shall not interfere with the nutritional or productive performance of Morada Nova sheep. These findings are highly relevant as they can explain the adaptability of native sheep to brackish waters found in a great number of underground wells of semi-arid regions in northeastern Brazil, besides allowing the watering of these animals without compromising their performance.
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