The objective of this trial was to study the partial replacement of ground corn with soybean hulls or corn germ meal in diets containing sunflower meal and urea as nitrogen sources and corn silage as forage for confined Nellore steers. Twenty-one steers averaging 25 months of age and 343 kg of initial body weight were assigned to diets containing a forage:concentrate ratio of 60:40. The period for measurements of intake and weight gain lasted 97 days. No significant differences were observed for intakes of dry matter (10.78, 9.73, and 10.62 kg/day), crude protein (1.40, 1.22, and 1.41 kg/day), and neutral detergent fiber (3.41, 3.89, and 3.60 kg/day), respectively, for diets containing ground corn, soybean hulls, and corn germ meal. However, intake of acid detergent fiber was highest (0.71% BW) for steers consuming the diet that soybean hulls replaced 70% of ground corn. Weight gain did not differ averaging 1.35, 1.29, and 1.32 kg/day feeding ground corn, soybean seed hulls, and corn germ meal, respectively. In addition, no significant differences were observed for feed conversion (7.88 kg of DMI/kg of weight gain), feed efficiency (0.12 weight gain/kg of DMI), and carcass dressing (54.52%) across treatments. It can be concluded that soybean hulls and corn germ meal can partially replace ground corn in diets for confined steers because both production and carcass dressing were maintained.
beef cattle; carcass dressing; feed conversion; intake; weight gain
