Cereal straws as animal feed - Possibilities and limitations

The cereal straws constitute a staple animal feed in tropical developing countries and are incorporated in the diet of ruminants in a significant proportion. The availability of nutrients from cereal straws is much lower than the potential of energy stored in these feeds. This energy is not available to the animals due to several reasons. Lignification of carbohydrates in cereal straws is one of the major constraints in the use of these feeds in the conventional diet of ruminants. For the last five decades a lot of experiments have been conducted on improving the digestibility of these feeds by physical, chemical and microbiological treatments in different laboratories of the world. Some of these experiments have been discussed and presented in the present review with advantages and disadvantages of these techniques.