Influence of brick supplementation on Gansu Alpine Merino production performance

In the present study, both sixty Gansu Alpine Merino pregnant ewes and another 60 2-year-old ewes with similar body condition were divided into two groups including control and block licking treatment to study the influence of supplementation brick on production performance in typical family ranch of Sunan County, Gansu Province. All the experiment groups were freely grazing with sheep herd on daytime and without brick for the control groups and freely brick licking for treatment groups in sheep pens for 165 days. For 2-year-old ewes and pregnant ewes, the average brick intake were 31.1 and 43.2 gd-1 and average molasses intake were 2.5 and 3.5 gd-1, respectively. Mineral elements and amino acids (methionine and lysine) were supplemented simultaneously. Both the average daily gain and lamb birth weight of pregnant ewes with brick licking were significantly higher than those of the control (P0.05). The survival rate of pregnant ewes with brick licking also increased although there was no significant difference.