Digestibility nutrient and digestible energy in diets for growing foals.

This study was conducted with eight colts Brasileiro de Hipismo breed, fed with five diets isocaloric and isonitrogenous with the aim of determining by the method of total fecal collection: the total apparent digestibility of nutrients as well as the values of digestible energy by comparing them with values from prediction equations of digestible energy. The diet 1: was composed of concentrated with corn and cotton meal; the diet 2: concentrated with corn and soybean meal, diet 3: concentrated with corn and yeast, diet 4: concentrated with oat and cotton meal and the diet 5: concentrated with oat and soybean meal. All diets contained Coast Cross hay and wheat bran. The test of digestion (total collection of feces) was made in metabolism cages adapted for horses for a period of five days. The diet had the lowest value of digestibility of dry matter was the diet of concentrated of oats and cotton meal. It was evident that one can not dispense with the need of using bomb calorimetry and the total collection of feces in the determination of digestible energy, because the calculations there was no equivalence of values between the results obtained in the experiment with the results obtained by the prediction equations.