ANN 121: Applied Animal Nutrition-I (2+1)

AMMONIA TREATMENT

• Anhydrous form or concentrated solution is used – 30 to 35 kg/ tonne of straw.
• Straw is stacked, ammonia solution is sprayed over the straw, kept covered for 20 days and then fed to the animals.
• This method not only increases the digestibility of the straw but also increases the nitrogen content of it.

Disadvantage

• On opening the stack, most of the ammonia is lost by volatilization.
• Sometimes there is formation of toxic imidazoles from reactions between ammonia and sugars leading to dementia (Bovine bonkers)