Effect of harvesting interval on biomass yield and chemical composition of taro (Colocasia esculenta (L.) Schott) for feeding pigs in Laos》.pdf

Field Crops Research 128 (2012) 71–75 Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect Field Crops Research j o u r n a l h o m e p ag e: w w w. elsev /locate/fcr Effect of harvesting interval on biomass yield and chemical composition of taro (Colocasia esculenta (L.) Schott) for feeding pigs in Laos Lampheuy Kaensombath a , Bodil E. Frankow-Lindberg b,∗ a National University of Laos, Dept. Livestock and Fisheries, PO Box 7322, Vientiane, Laos b Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Dept. Crop Production Ecology, Box 7043, SE-750 07 Uppsala, Sweden a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t Article history: Cheap feedstuffs with acceptable protein content are needed for the improvement of pig performance Received 19 October 2011 in developing countries, and the utilization of traditional crops is one possible solution. Taro (Colocasia Received in revised form esculenta (L.) Schott) was grown for two seasons in Vientiane, Lao PDR, and was subjected to three har- 20 December 2011 vesting frequency treatments. The treatments applied were harvesting leaves and petioles at intervals of Accepted 23 December 2011 4 (H4), 6 (H6) and 24 (H24) weeks, respectively. The tubers were harvested at the last harvest occasion. Leaf, petiole and tuber dry matter (DM) yield, leaf proportion (DM basis) and chemical composition of the Keywords: leaves and petioles were determined