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Is Malting Barley Better Feed for Cattle than Feed Barley?
Author(s) -
Fox Glen,
Kelly Alison,
Bowman Jan,
Inkerman Andy,
Poulsen David,
Henry Robert
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
journal of the institute of brewing
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.523
H-Index - 51
eISSN - 2050-0416
pISSN - 0046-9750
DOI - 10.1002/j.2050-0416.2009.tb00352.x
Subject(s) - biology , friability , trait , agronomy , heritability , starch , cultivar , husk , feed conversion ratio , dry matter , zoology , microbiology and biotechnology , food science , botany , body weight , bioavailability , bioinformatics , genetics , first pass effect , endocrinology , computer science , programming language
Barley grain from a combined intermediate and advanced barley breeding trial was assessed for grain, feed and malt quality from two sites over two consecutive years, with the objective to ascertain relationships between these traits. Results indicated there were genetic effects for both malt (hot water extract and friability) and “feed” traits (as measured by hardness, acid detergent fibre, starch and in‐sacco dry matter digestibility). The feed trait values were generally independent of the malt trait values. However, there were positive relationships between friability, hardness and protein, as well as a negative relationship between extract and husk. Extract also had a positive relationship with test weight but appeared to be independent from the feed traits. Test weight also showed little relationship to the feed traits. Heritability values ranged from low to high for almost all traits. This study details where both malt and cattle feed parameters have been compared and the results indicated that while malt and feed traits do not correlate directly, malt cultivars can exhibit excellent feed characteristics, equal to or better than feed cultivars. This data highlights the benefit of selecting for malt quality even if a breeding program would be interested at targeting specific feed quality.