The digestibility experiments have been carried on in order to find out the simplest method of rice-straw-disintegration. The methods of disintegration exa-mined are as follows:
1. Boiling for 1.5 hours in 1% milk of lime and no washing.
2. Soaking for 2 days in 1% milk of lime and no washing.
3. Soaking for 2 days in wood ash solution, followed by washing, alkalinity of which was equivalent to 0.9% of NaOH.
The average digestibility for sheeps and the calculated starch value may be shown in the following table.
From the results stated above, the author came to the conclusion that the simplest and the most effective method is to soak the straw in 1% milk of lime for 2 days. By the employment of this method, as in the case of boiling process, the nutritive value is very high, about twice as that of the untreated straw
