Nutrition tips

Beware of Feed efficiency

"Feed efficiency is a "hot" topic in dairy nutrition these days. But, this idea needs to be approached with caution. Remember, this is a concept developed for meat producing animals - an agricultural system where longevity is not related to profit. A few thoughts to illustrate the dangers of being too focussed on feed efficiency.
What is the most efficient cow on any given dairy farm? One who's losing weight. Obviously not a profitable situation in the long term. - Which cows are the least efficient on the dairy? Late lactation and dry cows. If cows aren't bred back, these "inefficient" producers will be eliminated. But, how profitable is that?"

Author

Bill Nelson, Nelson Consulting

Date

February 2006

 

Mixing a TMR to meet precise dietary guidelines has been compared to measuring something with a micrometer and then cutting it with an axe. This is particularly a problem with bulkier, low inclusion ingredients like long hay, straw and whole cottonseed. One way to get around trying to accurately load small amounts of bulky feedstuffs is to make a "complete" or "dry" mix which contains all TMR ingredients other than the ensiled forages. Generally, this approach will reduce day to day variation in the TMR because of the larger quantities being weighed. In addition, many farms find they save labor and equipment costs because the feeder will only need to load concentrate feedstufs once or twice a day instead of once for every group fed.

Author

Corwin Holtz, Holtz-Nelson Consulting

Date

March 2006

Refused feed happens- What should we do with it? Many dairies that feed TMR follow an ad libitum feeding scheme where a certain amount of uneaten feed is expected at the end of the day. This amount may range from 3-5% or even higher. In a small herd, this refused feed might be just enough to fatten a couple of beef cows or feed to heifers. In larger herds, even a 3% refusal can be alot of feed. At DDI, refusals were pilling up at a rate of 1-1.5 tons per day. Because of our Johne's control program, feeding refusals to heifers was not an option. Refeeding to the low cows worked during cool weather, but there was alot of day to day variability in how much of the low cow TMR was made up of refusals. Spreading uneaten feed on fields just added to the expense. A few neighbors were happy to take this refused feed for their beef animals, but none of the initial feed cost was being covered with this method. Instead of focussing on WHAT to do with the refused feed, attention was shifted towards NOT HAVING refused feed. Feeding procedures were changed so that refused feed was pushed to the end of the feed alley, but not removed immediately. That way, the feeder was able to deliver feed to a clean feed area as soon as the TMR was mixed. However, between clean out and feeding, any hungry animals could walk down and eat their fill. It appears that the more timid animals take advantage of this opportunity quite frequently. Even better, by the time all feeding is complete and it is time to remove the previous day's refused feed from the end of the feed alley, there is very little left.

Author

Larry Jones, Dairy Development International

Date

March 2006

Feeding to an empty bunk is a common practice to improve feed efficiency in beef feed lots. A number of dairy producers and consultants recommend this practice to reduce feed wastage; however, it requires a great deal of feed management expertise. Our experiences at DDI identified a number of possible pitfalls. These included; 1. Variation in ability to learn to "read" the bunk to determine whether to increase or decrease the amounts fed. 2. Reading bunks first thing in the morning (2 or 3 hours prior to feeding for the last groups) resulted in alot of error because changes in weather, temperature, or cow movement could affect consumption over those last few hours. 3. Feeders needed to be educated on what edible weighbacks looked like. Just because there was something in the bunk, didn't mean it wasn't empty. 4. Feeders needed to be reminded that the goal wasn't to have no refused feed, but to deliver feed just as the last edible bites were being consumed. 5. Order of feeding changed from day to day depending on each pen's intake. This added labor and was very stressful to some of the feeders. 6. If the bunk is empty at the start of feeding, there needs to be some way to determine when the cows actually ran out of feed.

Author

Larry Jones, Dairy Development International

Date

March 2006