This fall may be a time for cow/calf producers in and around Oklahoma to consider retaining calves this fall, or even buying them to sell as feeders next spring, said Oklahoma State University State Extension Beef Nutrition Specialist Paul Beck, in a letter to Extension agents called Cow-Calf Corner.
Lack of wheat pasture and cost of hay and feed have priced most normal production systems out of the market, Beck said. Some other options that should be considered include using low-quality products from grain, cotton or peanut processing as roughage replacements in self-fed rations.
AVAILABLE ROUGHAGE
Products like cotton gin trash, peanut hulls or rice mill feed may be locally available or have the potential to be shipped in at a low enough price to be viable options for growing calves or wintering beef cows, he said.
Rice mill feed is a blend of 67% ground rice hulls and 33% rice bran from the rice milling industry, Beck said. Gin trash is made up of cotton leaves, seed, immature bolls, stems and lint from the cotton ginning process. Peanut hulls are the shells of the peanuts removed during processing. All are high in fiber but can be extremely variable in composition and nutrient profile.
Self-feeding rations composed of rice mill feed and corn or rice mill feed and soybean hulls along with free-choice hay offered separately showed some promising results for growing calves, he said. Research from Alabama in 2004 showed growing steers fed a blend of 60% rice mill feed and 40% corn gained more than 2.2 pounds a day and consumed nearly 22 pounds of feed and three pounds of hay per day. Dry matter intakes were more than 3.3% of their bodyweight.
As corn replaced more rice mill feed gains and intake of feed increased but hay intake decreased, Beck said. Feed efficiencies in this system ranged from 8.3 to 11.1 total pounds of feed and hay per pound of gain for the 40/60 rice mill feed/corn and 60/40 rice mill feed/corn blend, respectively.
When soybean hulls were used as the energy source in similar rations, steers fed 70% rice mill feed and 30% soybean hulls consumed more than 26 pounds of the feed and four pounds of hay on a dry matter basis, he said. This equated to more than 4.5% of bodyweight in daily dry matter consumption.
Steers on the 70% rice mill feed diet gained 2.2 pounds per day, and as more soybean hulls replaced rice mills feed intake and average daily gains increased, but hay intake decreased.
Similar research from Alabama in 2008 used peanut hulls and cotton gin trash as roughage replacements in self-fed rations, Beck said.
CATTLE, BEEF RECAP
The USDA reported formula and contract base prices for live FOB steers and heifers this week ranged from $143.40 to $149.16 per cwt, compared with last week’ range of $144.00 to $148.91. FOB dressed steers, and heifers went for $227.54 to $232.17 per cwt, versus $225.42 to $230.93.
The USDA choice cutout Thursday was up $0.23 per cwt at $253.62 while select was down $0.11 at $222.08. The choice/select spread widened to $31.54 from $31.20 with 140 loads of fabricated product and 38 loads of trimmings and grinds sold into the spot market.
The USDA said basis bids for corn from feeders in the Southern Plains were unchanged at $2.10 to $2.25 a bushel over the Dec futures and for southwest Kansas were steady at $1.00 over Dec, which settled at $6.84, up 5 3/4.
No live cattle contracts were tendered for delivery Thursday.
The CME Feeder Cattle Index for the seven days ended Wednesday was $172.77 per cwt up $0.74. This compares with Thursday’s Oct contract settlement of $175.57, up $0.35.