REGULAR ARTICLES Replacement levels of elephant grass by moist pineapple by-product silage in diets of Santa Inês crossbred sheep: performance and digestibility Darley Oliveira Cutrim & Kaliandra Souza Alves & José Neuman Miranda Neiva & Luis Rennan Sampaio de Oliveira & Rafael Mezzomo & Acaína Kiss da Silva Elias & Vanessa Jaqueline Veloso da Mata & Rozilda da Conceição dos Santos & Daiany Íris Gomes Accepted: 6 September 2012 / Published online: 25 September 2012 # Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2012 Abstract The present study evaluated the effect of replacing elephant grass (EG) with moist pineapple by-product silage (PS) on the apparent digestibility, consumption of digestible nutrients and performance of 25 castrated male lambs Santa Ines crossbreds. The lambs had an initial body weight of 20.2 ±3.5 kg and were housed in individual pens in a completely randomised design with five treatments (replacement of EG by PS at five proportions of 0, 25, 50, 75 and 100 %) and five replicates during 74 days. There was no significant effect of PS replacement proportions on the intake of dry matter (DM), organic matter (OM), total carbohydrates (TC), non-fibrous carbohydrates or total digestible nutrients (TDN). The con- sumption of crude protein (CP) decreased linearly with the inclusion of PS in the diets. The digestibility of DM, OM and TCs as well as levels of TDN increased linearly with the addition of PS. The use of PS in the diets had no significant effect on the digestibility of CP and neutral detergent fibre corrected for ashes and protein (NDFom(n)). These results demonstrated that there was no difference in the performance of animals fed diets with or without PS. Keywords By-products . Feeds . Nutrition . Production . Ruminant Introduction In recent years, the use of agricultural by-products for feeding ruminants has been the subject of several studies in Brazil and the rest of world (Costa et al. 2007). Among the reasons for the growth in this research area is the high cost of feed for animal production, thus leading to searches for alternative low cost feeds that provide both a satisfactory performance and a reduc- tion in production costs. Additionally, if not properly disposed of, such products may create potential environmental problems representing a loss of energy and raw materials of high nutri- tional value that could be used in the diets of various species, such as sheep. Pineapple (Ananas comosus L.) is a widely grown fruit in tropical and subtropical regions around the globe, its juice is one of the most important non-citrus juices and is ranked Parte do projeto de pesquisa financiado pelo CNPq D. O. Cutrim : A. K. da Silva Elias UFRA, Belém, Pará, Brazil D. O. Cutrim (*) : K. S. Alves : L. R. S. de Oliveira : R. Mezzomo : D. Í. Gomes Campus de Parauapebas, UFRA, Rua A, S/N—quadra especial, Cidade Nova, Parauapebas, Pará CEP 68515-000, Brazil e-mail: darleycutrim@hotmail.com K. S. Alves e-mail: kaliandra.alves@ufra.edu.br J. N. M. Neiva Escola de Medicina Veterinária e Zootecnia, UFT, Araguaina, Tocantins, Brazil J. N. M. Neiva e-mail: araguaia2007@gmail.com V. J. V. da Mata : R. da Conceição dos Santos UFRA, Parauapebas, Pará, Brazil Trop Anim Health Prod (2013) 45:585–592 DOI 10.1007/s11250-012-0263-5