Growing your own feed despite the cost of time and equipment can have many benefits. Having an inventory on hand can reduce some risks of short supplies. It can also help protect you from any seasonal price volatility. Both energy and protein production can better match your herd’s requirements for simple feed use.
However, despite all of this, there is still the risk of the weather turning against you. Weather events in the weeks, days, and even hours leading up to the harvest can ruin your best efforts. It can transform a carefully raised feed source into a nutritional time bomb. If you are not careful, it can not only reduce your production. Still, it can also endanger the lives of your animals.
Times of extreme stress, like currently with the drought, can cause a build-up of nitrates. While consuming some of them is not bad for your animals, if they eat too much of them, then it can become deadly. Here are some things to look for to prevent this from happening.
Gut health is one of the often underutilized components of a successful operation. Sure, people have a basic understanding of it when it comes to nutrients and their absorption, but that is usually as far as it goes. Producers often need to fully understand what it entails or even what factors can influence it.
Trich, or the more scientific name Trichomoniasis, is a severe economic problem for cattle producers. Some of the problems it can cause are a reduced calf crop and lower weaning weights. It can cause this because it makes your breeding cows infertile and possibly causes a more extended breeding season.
Internal parasites are a problem that every beef producer must face. It is a constant annoyance that can rob a beef operation of its productivity. They impair production by increasing things like energy costs of maintenance, diet digestibility, and immune activity.
Summer pneumonia, sometimes referred to as pasture pneumonia, is a disease that is usually observed in calves on pasture late in summer. It can affect calves that have yet to be weaned from just one-month-old to even five months of age. The issue with this disease is that not much is known about it, and it can pop up from nowhere.
With summer arriving, treating pinkeye is an issue many cattle producers will face. As things get drier, it means more dust which means an increase in eye irritants.
It is never good whenever your cattle are suffering from diseases. It can rob you of performance while at the same time increasing your expenses.
Pinkeye is a very common as well as a highly contagious disease in cattle. Once it shows up if you do not take proper steps immediately it can quickly affect all of your cattle.
Bovine Leukemia Virus is a hidden but damaging infection. In fact, this thing could be in your herd right now and you would likely not even know it is there. It already has a major impact on the cattle industry at large.
Dehydration among calves is a very serious problem that is often overlooked among producers. It can be caused for many reasons but typically from the summer heat and scours. The time from recognizing the symptoms to providing treatment is very important.
