Avaliação da silagem de milho em fazendas leiteiras de Patos de Minas, MG

Abstract

Minas Gerais has the largest milk producer in Brazil. In this state, stands out the county of Patos de Minas, the third largest producer of Brazilian milk. Among the bulky foods used in diets of dairy cows, the corn silage (Zea mays) has been highlighted, due to its good productivity, good ensilability, besides several studies that guarantee the technological advance of the crop, compared to other forage plants. However, most of the studies on corn crop for silage production have been done in laboratory conditions, and few field data. Considering the value of the county in the milk activity and the impact of the silage on the activity, the objective of this study was evaluated the corn silages and as management practices with silages used in the dairy properties of the city of Patos de Minas, MG. A total of 31 randomly selected dairy farms were visited in the county, where was applied a quiz with questions related to ownership, the silage process and the use of this voluminous. The silos were measured and the silage panel was observed to verify homogeneity and deteriorated layers. Representative samples of the silages were collected to evaluate the dry matter content and particle size. Metric evaluations of the silos were done to calculate the panel area. The middle temperatures of the silos were also measured. The cluster analysis was performed to group the evaluated properties. The continuous variables of the farm groups were submitted to analysis of variance in a completely randomized design and the averages were compared by the Tukey test, while the means of the discrete variables were compared by the chi-square test, due to the type I error. The average temperature found within the silos of the dairy properties of Patos de Minas, MG, is higher than the ambient temperature. The properties with low milk production are characterized by lack of technical advice and tend to present panels of silos disuniforms, with manual withdrawal, resulting in greater discarding (loss) of silage.