Table 11.

Lactation performance of dairy ewes ¹ supplemented with rumen undegraded protein (RUP) and fed or grazing forage of varying proportions of alfalfa

Trait	RUP Supplement			% alfalfa in forage
	No	Yes	SEM	0	25	50	75	SEM
Cut-and-carry trial:2
Milk yield, kg/d	1.79f	1.95e	0.06	1.74g	1.85f	1.94e	1.95e	0.06
Fat yield, g/d	122	123	3	117	122	124	127	4
Protein yield, g/d	90	95	2	85b	90b	96a	98a	3
Milk urea nitrogen, mg/dL	12.3b	15.1a	0.8	10.9d	12.7c	14.3b	16.8a	0.7
Grazing trial:3
Milk yield, kg/d	1.65	1.82	0.16	1.55g	1.78f	1.87e		0.11
Fat yield, g/d	105	115	11	102	113	116		8
Protein yield, g/d	84	94	7	78a	90a,b	98b		5
Milk urea nitrogen, mg/dL	18.2	19.8	1.0	15.0b	19.8a	22.1a		0.8

¹Multiparous crossbred ewes of East Friesian and Lacaune breeding.

²n = 16 ewes; 8 pens of 2 ewes each. 4 pens randomly assigned to each supplement treatment. Within supplementation treatment, pens were randomly assigned to 1 of 4 forage treatments, which were applied in a 4 × 4 Latin square design for 10-d periods.

³n = 12 ewes; 3 groups of 4 ewes each. 2 ewes in each group randomly assigned to each supplement treatment. Grazing treatments were arranged in a 3 × 3 Latin square design and randomly applied to groups for 10-d periods.

^a,b,c,dMeans within a row and treatment with no superscript in common are different (P < 0.05).

^e,f,gMeans within a row and treatment with no superscript in common are different (P < 0.10).