Forage crops are an essential nutrient source in animal nutrition for meeting nutrient requirements and stimulating appetite as green forage. However, providing fresh forage to animals throughout the year is challenging or even impossible in our country. This situation, due to limited cultivation areas and insufficient yield per unit area, prevents the complete fulfillment of roughage and concentrate feed requirements of farm animals in terms of quality and quantity. This leads to productivity losses in animal production and increased feed costs. Therefore, various studies are currently being conducted to ensure the supply of green forage throughout the year.For this purpose, in this study, the nutritional composition (dry matter, ASH, crude protein, crude fat, crude fiber, NDF, ADF), in vitro digestibility parameters, and methane production levels of hydroponically produced forms of barley, wheat, corn, oat, and sorghum grains cultivated in the Niğde region were determined. Raw, room temperature-dried, and oven-dried forms of hydroponic grains were compared; nutrient contents, energy values, in vitro gas production, pH, ammonia, and methane productions were analyzed to evaluate their potential use in ruminant nutrition. The findings revealed that although hydroponic grains provided high crude protein content (15.96-16.04%), organic matter digestibility (47.92-82.80%) and energy values (ME ranging from 7.59-12.59 MJ/kg DM) showed variability. As a result of the findings obtained, hydroponically produced grains were found to have limited usability as an alternative feed source in ruminant animal nutrition.
Boğa et al. (Tue,) studied this question.