Some Rumen and Blood Metabolites and Total Bacterial Count in Camels

Abstract

Camels production is very important in the Sudan and nutrition is a main constraint for camels production due to rangeland deterioration and seasonal variations in feeds quantity and quality affecting animals health and performance . In addition modern nutritional concepts are not applied due to lack of information. Consequently, a series of experiments were conducted to furnish the required information. Three rumen fistulated Arabian camels were used to study some rumen and blood metabolites and total bacterial count (TBC). The animals were fed Medicago sativa (Barseem) ad libitum and concentrate ration at 0 (A), 3 (B) and 1.5 (C) kg daily. Rumen and blood samples were collected at different times (before feeding, during feeding and at 2, 6 and 9hrs after feeding) to study some rumen and blood metabolites and total bacterial count. Results showed that rumen pH (5.13 - 6.17) varied significantly (P<0.05) with time in diets A and C before and at feeding with diet B at 9hrs after feeding . Rumen ammonia - N (144.67 - 192.27) mg/l and urea (24.30 - 43.10) mg/dl, blood urea (53.0 - 65.73) mg/dl and total bacterial count (3.82 - 7.38) log10 CFU/ml were not significantly (P>0.05) affected with time and treatments and interaction between treatments and time was not significant (P>0.05). It is concluded that rumen pH, ammonia - N and urea, blood urea and total bacterial count were affected with feeding time at all concentrate ration levels and times for the highest and least values varied among diets as we recommend that Further studies are required on camels rumen metabolites and microbes and blood metabolites on different feeds.