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OSU Extension BEEF Team

BEEF Cattle questions may be directed to the OSU Extension BEEF Team through Stephen Boyles or Stan Smith, Editor

You may subscribe to this weekly BEEF Cattle letter by sending a blank e-mail to beef-cattle-on@ag.osu.edu

Previous issues of the BEEF Cattle letter

Issue # 559

October 24, 2007

Opportunity Comes with Intensity - Kris Ringwall, Beef Specialist, NDSU Extension Service

Many opportunities exist within agriculture. Most are driven by the opportunity to make more money, but some are driven by the opportunity to do something different.

In either case, the successful completion of the endeavor is not always positive.

Frank Kutka, sustainable agricultural specialist at the North Dakota State University Dickinson Research Extension Center, attended a conference on goat production. Given my background in small ruminants, primarily sheep, it didn't take long to engage in a good discussion about the conference and the world of smaller ruminants.

Having taught the key management principles involved in small-ruminant production, the learning curve often was steep and producer success was not always achieved. In the end, neither the sheep nor the goat industries have successfully engaged mainstream production levels capable of sustaining viable production scenarios of scale.

As a force within ruminant production, the vast majority of grassland-related agriculture still centers on the beef cow. The dairy cow is obviously present, but many producers have set aside the milk bucket and, with time, beef cows are grazing on the pastures.

Why beef cows? Well, the answer is not simple. One does have to be careful not to offend anyone. However, in our discussion, the phrase "opportunity comes with intensity" seemed to surface more than once.

We both concurred that, in many cases, the intensity of management needed to successfully engage a small-ruminant operation is not achieved. That statement is not meant to offend, but, having conducted many three-day, intensive schools on sheep production, it is true.

While I am quickly reminded this is a beef column, I could not help making the connection to the many issues that beef producers face. Generally, most would agree that today's beef business, if one sets aside the comfort that comes with higher prices and simply looks at the industry and then sets about engaging that industry head on, is very complicated.

Not unlike the sheep and goat business, the changes that need to be made are intense. Additional opportunity is dependent on our willingness to engage change with intensity. Often times in the sheep business, producers complain that their sheep simply died.

No, you simply allowed the sheep to die, was my response. As a producer, you were unwilling to take the necessary managerial steps needed to ensure the survival of the sheep.

Accepting that the primary reason for failure was your own managerial decisions and general overall resistance to change is difficult to accept. The need to increase management intensity to meet the expected opportunity must be met.

In the beef industry, producers simply lack the desire to explore new opportunities. As producers look backward and forward, the need to access new opportunities needs to happen. However, often times, even when one does take on a new challenge, the intensity of the change is underestimated.

The current age and source verification effort is a good example. There are new vaccinations, reproductive techniques, breeding programs, supplementation programs, marketing exposure, business planning or simply new associates entering the business.

A new level of intensity is necessary. Refusing to increase intensity, however, means forgoing complaining about the future.

I had the great opportunity to have supper with several veterinarians from around the world. When asked what was the greatest restraint they encountered while working with producers, they commented that many do not want to change and they simply restrict their own opportunities by never allowing them to become reality.

Opportunity comes with intensity and that intensity needs to be engaged.

Forage Focus: Protein and Energy Supplementation of Crop Residues for Breeding Cattle - Francis L. Fluharty, Ph.D., Department of Animal Sciences, The Ohio State University

This summer's drought conditions in much of Ohio, West Virginia, and Kentucky continue to be cause for concern as many people are already feeding this winter's hay supply. In response, The Ohio State University Extension Beef Team has posted several excellent articles to our web page (http://beef.osu.edu) over the recent months which deal with various aspects of nutrition and beef cattle management.

Regardless, over the past three weeks, two of the most common questions I've heard are 'what can I feed' and 'what's the value of corn stover'? Here are a few thoughts to consider.

First, the good news is that we have several sources of alternative sources of high-energy feeds in this area including corn, distillers grains, and pelleted soybean hulls. However, the price of these is going up rapidly, and the time to act is now. Additionally, many producers do not have the facilities to store distillers grains or soybean hulls, or the ability to purchase them in semi-load amounts. This has led many people to turn to corn stover or even soybean stubble bales as a primary source of feed. Usually, our problem in this part of the country is meeting a cow or heifer's energy needs, because our grass/legume mixtures are relatively high in protein. When feeding corn stover or soybean stubble, this is NOT the case, and a readily digestible protein source must be used.

Cattle need adequate protein to grow, mount an immune response, reproduce, maintain a pregnancy, or give birth to and nurse a healthy calf. Adequate protein supplementation also facilitates the digestion of feed stuffs.

Forages have lignin, an indigestible complex chemical compound that gives strength to plant cell walls. Corn stalks have a higher percentage of lignin than leafy forages, and soybean stubble has much more lignin than corn stalks. Immature, leafy forages and grains don't have very much lignin, and thus their rate of digestion is much greater.

Two things must happen to aid in the digestion of low protein, high lignin feeds. Adequate supplemental protein must be provided and the particle size of the material should be reduced. This is why cattle 'chew their cud'. They are re-chewing forages to break down the particle size so that more surface area is available for fungi growth and bacterial attachment which results in digestion, as well as breaking down the particle size of lignin-bound material so that it can pass out of the rumen undigested.

If low-protein feeds that are high in lignin such as straw, corn stover, and soybean stubble are not chopped and supplemented with appropriate sources of protein, then animal performance is reduced.

All that being said, drought conditions mean that producers are doing things differently than they have routinely done in order to keep feed prices at somewhat reasonable levels. While some cattlemen are simply selling females, others are separating older cows from heifers and 2 year-old females, feeding twice daily, chopping or grinding forage, or feeding alternative sources of energy.

As we consider alternative feeds, it's very important to know the energy and protein levels in your feed, but it's just as important to take into account a feed's digestibility. If corn has a digestibility of 95%, and corn stover has a digestibility of 55%, which one is a better source of energy?

Put potential feed alternatives on a price per pound rather than simply comparing the bushel price of corn to the bale price of stover. If corn is $3.36 per bushel, it's $.06 per pound ($3.36 ÷ 56 lb = .06/lb). If a 1000 pound bale of stover costs $30, it's $.03 per pound ($30 ÷ 1000 lb = .03/lb). However, the net energy for maintenance (NEm) of stover is only 51% of that for corn (1.14 Mcal/kg versus 2.24 Mcal/kg). Therefore, on an energy basis for maintenance, they cost the same. However, the net energy for gain (NEg) of corn is 2.7 times higher than that of corn stover (1.55 Mcal/kg versus .58 Mcal/kg) making corn a more economical energy feed for gain.

If corn is $.06 per pound the price per pound of corn stover would have to be $.022 to be equivalent for gain ($.06 ÷ 2.7 = $.022), making the price of a 1000 pound bale of stover be $22 to be equal for energy. All of this assumes that corn stover and corn grain have the same digestibility, and protein content, which they don't. If corn grain is 95% digestible, and corn stover is 55% digestible, then poor feed intake becomes a problem with corn stover, due to the length of time that the stover remains in the rumen before it is digested or chewed to particle sizes small enough to pass out of the rumen, and the corn grain becomes even more economical.

This is just one example. When considering the value of other energy feeds such as distillers grains, corn gluten feed, or pelleted soybean hulls, it's still important to put things into perspective by looking at a price per pound of digestible nutrients.

In many parts of the world, straw is fed as a roughage source to ruminant animals. While long-stem straw has a very low digestibility, the grinding of straw increases consumption. This leads to higher digestible energy intakes.

This brings up an important thing to consider. As the result of work done by Dr. Steve Loerch here at The Ohio State University, one effective option producers rarely consider is hay chopping. Chopping hay allows the cows to eat 25-30% more energy. Costs of chopping hay (equipment, labor, etc.) should be compared to costs of purchasing supplemental energy. For some producers, this may be a cost effective option. We have come to realize the potential of hay chopping from an observation at the OARDC Beef Center in Wooster. Steers fed a chopped hay based diet gained 2.5 lbs/day while those fed round baled hay (same hay source) in a rack gained less than 1.5 lbs/day.

So, if you are using corn stover, baled soybean stubble, straw or similar low quality forages as a cow feed, here are some key points to remember:

* Dry beef cows will need a diet that is 8% protein in the middle third of pregnancy and 9% protein in the last third of pregnancy. Pregnant yearling heifers will need a diet that is at least 11-12% protein, and heifers and cows nursing calves will need a diet that contains at least 12% protein.

* If heifers and young cows are not separated from older cattle, they may be pushed aside when given supplemental feeds, and they may not receive the protein or energy they require.

* With low-quality feeds, it is best to feed combinations of ruminally available (urea, soybean meal) and ruminally escape (corn gluten meal, distillers dried grains, fishmeal) protein sources.

* Soybean meal is an excellent protein source with low-quality forages, because approximately 80% of the soybean meal is degraded in the rumen, and the rumen microbial population must be given a source of N so that they can reproduce, before they can digest the low-protein forages.

* If you are using corn stover, straw, or baled soybean stubble as the main source of forage, it may be necessary to supplement a high-energy feed to your cattle such as corn, DDGS, CGF, or SBH in order to keep the animals in the proper body condition.

* If labor is an issue, and it is not feasible to feed protein supplements daily, it might be appropriate to use protein tubs or protein kegs for supplementation with low-protein feeds such as straw, corn stover, or soybean stubble. However, expect to pay 2 to 4 times more for the same amount of protein than you would have paid if a soybean meal and distillers dried grain combination had been used as a top-dress.

* Keep in mind that the mineral nutrition of your cow herd should not be compromised due to the need to purchase additional feed. Having a good mineral program will enhance performance, allow the animals to convert energy more efficiently, improve calf survivability and growth, and reduce the post-partum interval from calving to rebreeding.

EDITOR's NOTE: For a more detailed version of this article in either MS WORD or PDF, visit the Nutrition section of the OSU Beef Team web Library.

Some have asked if the residue remaining after the harvest of Bt corn hybrids offers any different results than feeding non-GMO corn residues. Articles published in the Journal of Animal Science suggests that incorporation of the Bt trait into corn had no consistent effect on cattle performance. In addition, background genetics of the corn hybrids appeared to have a more consistent impact on performance than did presence of the Bt trait.

You may find "Drylot Beef Cow/Calf Production" in both html and pdf formats in the OSU Extension Beef Team "Library" at http://beef.osu.edu.

Weekly Roberts Agricultural Commodity Market Report - Mike Roberts, Commodity Marketing Agent, Virginia Tech

LIVE CATTLE closed up on Monday. The DEC'07LC contract finished at $97.575/cwt, up $0.275/cwt. The FEB'08LC contract closed at $99.100/cwt, up $0.125/cwt. Short covering and hedge lifting provide support as fund buying extended gains. Cash cattle traded higher last week and traders expect more of the same this week. USDA reported the 5-area average price up $1.25/cwt-$2.00/cwt between $93.00/cwt and $93.50/cwt. Last week, the southern Plains markets were between $94.00/cwt and $94.50/cwt. Larger-than-expected placements put pressure on prices, running 109% of last year. On-feed supplies showed at 96% of last year despite the larger placements. On Monday, USDA put the choice boxed beef cutout at $143.72/cwt, down $0.88/cwt. Even though packer's margins are still negative, they kept up their kill pace with USDA estimating Monday's cattle slaughter at 129,000 head compared to 130,000 last week at the time and 122,000 a year ago. According to HedgersEdge.com, the average beef plant margin for Monday was estimated at a negative $25.00/head, $1.20/head worse than last Friday but $8.75/head better than a week ago. Cash sellers should hold sales until cattle are ready. It might be a good idea to price some near-term corn inputs if you can.

FEEDER CATTLE contracts at the CME were up on Monday with the exception of the October contract. OCT'07FC futures closed at $111.450/cwt, $0.050/cwt lower than last Friday. The NOV'07FC contract finished at $111.625/cwt, up $0.325/cwt but $1.600/cwt lower than last week. Lower corn futures and higher live cattle futures countered short covering. The latest CME Feeder Cattle Index for October 18 was put at $112.32/cwt, down $0.230/cwt. If you have grass it would be a good idea to hold onto those feeders for a little bit.

Visit the OSU Beef Team calendar of meetings and upcoming events

BEEF Cattle is a weekly publication of Ohio State University Extension in Fairfield County and the OSU Beef Team. Contributors include members of the Beef Team and other beef cattle specialists and economists from across the U.S.

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