By: Dr. Katie Wood, Associate Professor, Animal Biosciences, University of Guelph and Madeline McLennan, M.Sc. Student, Animal Biosciences, University of Guelph
This article was originally published in the October 2024 edition of Virtual Beef.
Although forage choppers and bale processors are not new technologies, there is a surprizing lack of data in how they can benefit beef cow performance. Feed is the largest cost to cow-calf producers and winter-feeding costs can account for two thirds of the primary production costs in Canada. To offset these costs lower quality forages can be included in total mixed rations (TMR). However, these forages can cause palatability, gut fill, rumen fermentation, intake, and digestibility challenges for cattle. One strategy to overcome these challenges is chopping these forages to a smaller and more uniform particle size. This has previously been investigated for ensiled forages and the dairy industry has observed several performance benefits. The chopping of forage can help to improve rumen passage rate, digestibility, and improve feed intake. However, the cow-calf sector has yet to quantify similar performance advantages with the use of bale processing technology. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the use of forage processing and chopping technology and its impact on animal performance, feeding behaviour, digestibility, and efficiency.
Researchers from the University of Guelph conducted a study that measured differences between the performance of gestating beef cows fed diets containing 33% wheat straw, 64% mixed haylage, and 3% vitamin and mineral pellet, that only differed in terms of the length of straw in the TMR. One group was fed a TMR containing 7-inch unchopped wheat straw and a second group was fed a TMR with 2-inch processed wheat straw. Researchers observed that animals fed the short straw diet consumed 1.43 kg/d (DM basis) more than the animals fed the long straw diet. It was also observed that the cows fed a short straw ration gained or maintained body condition more than the cows fed the long straw diet, likely due to this increased intake. Researchers identified that along with increased intake the groups fed the short straw diet sorted less against large and medium particles compared to the groups fed the long straw diet. This was analysed with a Penn State Particle Separator.
Researchers concluded that the processing and chopping of these lower-quality forages in gestating beef cow rations can help to improve palatability, intake, and animal performance. In addition, the reduction in sorting behaviour can help to ensure that each animal in a pen is consuming the same ration and that it is consumed more accurately to its formulation.
This work showed that chopping low quality forages, like wheat straw, increased DM intake, supporting BCS gain in late gestation. Though this work has helped to quantify the key benefits for the use of this technology in cow-calf operations, there is still a question of “Does a bale processor make sense for my livestock operation?”, which likely depends upon several factors. There are not many studies that have quantified the time, cost, and waste reduction that is said to be the advantages of using this technology. Future work with this project will look to at labour and cost analysis, to help provide producers with a better understanding of the value of this equipment to their operation. Further information about bale processors/choppers can be found on the Seven Point Check List for Bale Processors by Blaine Metzger at the Alberta Agriculture, Food and Rural Development AgTech Centre webpage (11).
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