Cicer arietinum

Chickpea, garbanzo bean, Egyptian pea, gram pea, Bengal gram

Erect shrubby quick-growing annual about 50 cm high, native to western Asia. Adapted to a tropical climate with moderate temperatures and successfully cultivated under irrigation in the cool season of many tropical countries. The grain, young shoots and pods are used mostly for human consumption, and the rest of the plant for fodder after threshing. The hay is somewhat toxic. The seeds have been used at high levels in poultry diets, and normal egg production has been maintained with up to 80% pea meal in diets for layers if supplemented with 2% blood meal. Better results are obtained with autoclaved seeds (0.70 kg/cm , or 10 lb/in for 30 minutes) than with raw or soaked seeds; up to 15 kg per day have been fed to high-yielding cows with good results. Raw chickpeas support satisfactory growth in pigs even when constituting 80% of the diet. At high rates of inclusion, methionine supplementation of 0.2% improves growth.

As % of dry matter

DM

CP

CF

Ash

EE

NFE

Ca

P

Ref

Fresh, aerial part,

India

11.3

27.2

11.4

2.2

47.9

1.41

0.25

436

Straw, India

90.6

6.0

44.4

13.3

0.5

35.8

0.34

0.12

282

Hay, India

12.9

35.3

11.2

1.5

39.1

1.53

0.20

436

Pods, India

95.1

17.0

25.0

9.6

2.9

45.5

1.39

0.24

"

Seeds, Malaysia

88.9

25.8

10.1

3.6

3.9

56.6

292

Seeds, India

18.1

9.8

3.5

4.9

63.7

0.26

0.41

436

Bran, Chile

88.4

15.7

24.3

7.0

4.2

48.8

1.56

0.31

315

Pod husk, India

5.8

48.4

6.0

0.9

38.9

436

Digestibility (%)

Animal

CP

CF

EE

NFE

ME

Ref

Straw

Cattle

40.0

40.0

0.0

47.0

1.35

282

Seeds

Sheep

66.2

56.9

63.6

93.0

3.11

512

Nylon bag degradability

a

b

c

12hr

48hr

Ref

(%)

(%)

(/hour)

(%)

(%)

Cicer arientinum,

straw,Portugal

DM

6.2

41.5

0.0397

40.8

627

[P (rumen degradability at time t) = a+b*(1-exp(-c*t))]

Amino acid composition as % of crude protein

Seed

Ref

259

Arg

Cys

Gly

Hys

Ils

Leu

Lys

Met

Phe

Thr

Try

Tyr

Val

7.3

1.0

3.9

4.5

7.9

14.1

10.0

1.1

8.0

5.0

1.8

4.7

4.9