A NOTE ON THE USE OF FIELD BEANS (VICIA-FABA) IN LAMB FINISHING DIETS

Two feeding experiments with housed lambs of the Spanish Manchega breed were carried out over 2 years with the aim of assessing the suitability of field beans in lamb finishing diets. In the 1st year field beans were compared with soya-bean meal as a protein source in a factorial experimental design with the proportion of maize in the diet being 0.15, 0.25 or 0.35. In the second experiment the effect of replacing soya-bean meal and sunflower meal by inclusion of field beans at proportions, 0, 0.1, 0.2, 0.3 and 0.4 of the diet was studied. All diets were isoenergetic and isoproteic. The composition of the diets had no significant effects on the average daily gain or the food conversion ratio in either experiment. Results from experiment 2 showed that the increasing amount of field beans in the basal diet did not affect protein, fat and water content of a loin sample of meat, or fatty acid composition of kidney fat.