COMPORTAMENTO DE TOURINHOS NELORE EM PASTEJO RECEBENDO 25-OH-VITAMINA D3

Abstract

The objective of this study was to evaluate the effect of 25-OH Vit D3 on the behavior and performance of Nellore young bulls, in the rainy season and rainy to dry transition, the animals used in Experiments 1 and 2 are unequal and independent. In Experiment 1, one hundred and twenty animals with an average body weight (BW) of 300 ± 26 kg and 18 months of age were used. The treatments were protein supplement (Fosbovi® Proteico 30, DSM, Brazil) without additives - Control, protein supplement with 320 mg/kg of Sodium Monensin - Mon, and protein supplement with 25-OH Vit D3 - (Hy-D®, DSM, Brazil), at a dose adjusted to the daily consumption of 1 mg/animal. In Experiment 2, ninety animals with body weight 445 kg ± 27 kg and age of 21 months were used. The treatments consisted of a protein-energy supplement (Fosbovi® Protein-Energy 25M, DSM, Brazil) - Control, or the same protein-energy supplement 25M, with 25-OH Vit D3 (Hy-D®, DSM, Brazil), at a dose adjusted for daily consumption of 1 mg/animal. The animals were housed during the two experiments in six paddocks of U. brizantha cv.Marandu (syn.Brachiaria), equipped with electronic feeders (Intergado®), allowing the daily evaluation of individual consumption. The experiment was conducted in a completely randomized design, using the PROC GLIMMIX of SAS On Demand (SAS Institute Inc., Cary, CA), and the means of the treatments were compared using the Pdiff option of LSMEANS, adopting a significance level of 5%. In experiment 1: The animals with Monensin had a more active grazing behavior and those fed with Hy-D® showed a more selective grazing behavior (P