ABSTRACT
The human requirements for animal protein makes it increasingly important to utilize all available pastureland, which to a large extent lies in climatically unfavorable
Desert Research Center, Cairo, Egypt. Email: saai54@hotmail.com
regions. In these areas, the animals often have to consume the only available feed resource which is halophytic plants (Attia-Ismail et al. 2009). However, feed resources defi ciency is considered one of the basic constraints to improving animal productivity in arid and semi-arid regions. Improving the nutritional status of desert grazing livestock (sheep, camels and goats) particularly during the prolonged dry seasons would increase the average annual animal production by approximately 27%. Attention has been directed towards the necessity of utilizing the marginal resources, i.e., saline soils and underground water for producing unconventional animal feed ingredients. The native natural rangelands constitute the principal feed resources in the Egyptian deserts. The biomass production and quality of the natural rangelands in such areas vary considerably from season to season and from area to area depending on several factors, mainly environmental factors. They are widely distributed throughout several regions of Egypt due to the presence of numerous salines along the Mediterranean Sea and Red Sea shores and inlands (littoral salt marshes and inland salt marshes) as reported by Batanouny (1993); El Shaer and Attia-Ismail (this volume).
