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- The use of sweet potato vine-based diet as partial milk substitute leads to a reduction of about 120 litres of milk fed to each calf over the 70-day study period.
- The average daily gain is higher for calves fed partial milk substitute (300 gms per day) than those fed milk and grazing only (175 gms per day).
- Sweet potato vine-based partial milk diets can be used as a substitute to reduce the cost of rearing a calf without adversely affecting its health and yet save more milk for consumption and processing but is inadequate as a sole source of nutrients for the Friesian bull-calf.
- The most appropriate sweet potato vine inclusion level in the partial milk substitute given the ingredients in this study was at 40% of total dry matter.
- Sweet potato vine-based partial milk substitutes can be used to reduce the net variable cost of feeding bull-calf by more than 50%.
