DOI: 10.11118/nutrinet2026_011

EFFECT OF PARTIAL SORGHUM INCLUSION IN FEED RATION OF DAIRY COWS ON MILK FATTY ACID PROFILE

Petr Malý¹, Ludmila Křížová¹, Tomáš Kašparovský¹

¹ Department of Biochemistry, Faculty of Science, Masaryk University, Kotlářská 267/2, 611 37 Brno, Czech Republic

The aim of this study was to assess the effect of the inclusion of approximately 5 kg of sorghum silage into the feed ration of dairy cows instead of the same amount of legume-grass silages on the fatty acid (FA) profile of milk. The on-farm experiment was conducted on 120 mid-lactating Czech Fleckvieh cows (Agrospol a.d. Knínice, farm Vanovice) and was divided into two consecutive periods of 3 months each. In the first period, cows were fed a total mixed ration based on maize silage and legume-grass silage (Control), while in the second period, legume-grass silage was partially replaced by sorghum silage (Sorghum). In each period, samples of evening and morning milk were taken from ten cows and were analysed for the FA profile, which was determined using gas chromatography equipped with a flame ionization detector. After the sorghum inclusion, the content of palmitic acid (C16) lowered (P < 0.05), and the content of pentadecenoic (C15:1), stearic (C18), arachidic (C20) and behenic acid (C22) increased (P < 0.05). The diet change also tended to decrease the content of eicosapentaenoic (C20:5n3) and tricosanoic acid (C23) (0.05 ≤ P < 0.1).

Klíčová slova: alternative feed, eicosapentaenoic acid, palmitic acid, stearic acid

stránky: 96-102, online: 2026