How Many Lbs Does a Beef Cow Eat in a Day
Determining How Much Forage a Beef Moo-cow Consumes Each Mean solar day
Apr 2013
It's April and for cow/dogie producers in the Northern Great Plains the majority of the cows are calving or are about to beginning calving. Cow/dogie producers during this fourth dimension period are typically feeding harvested forages. A frequent question from producers is "how much will my cows eat on a daily basis"? Producers want to come across the cows' nutrient requirement, but certain don't desire to over-feed expensive forages. With the dry conditions this past summer and harvested forages at a premium, closely estimating the amount of feed needed to go through the wintertime and early on leap will be of import to comprise price.
The Difference Betwixt Intake on a Dry Matter and Equally Is Basis
This can be a challenging concept to explicate – what the difference between dry out matter and every bit-fed – peculiarly when nutriments for beef cows are on a dry matter basis. Intake on a dry matter basis means that the forage doesn't include moisture. However, we know that the forages contain moisture and not all forages contain the same amount of moisture. And so if fodder intake can be determined on a dry matter basis, it tin can easily be converted to an "as is" or "every bit-fed" basis.
As an case, if it were determined the daily dry matter intake of a grouping of ane,200 pound cow eating an average quality hay is 24 pounds per head and the hay that they are consuming is 88% dry affair, these cows would eat nearly 27 (24 pounds/.88) pounds per caput per day on an every bit-fed basis.
If the same grouping of ane,200 pound cows are fed a ration where role of the ration called for corn silage to be fed at 10 pounds per head per day on a dry out affair basis and the corn silage is 35% dry matter and 65% moisture, the pounds of corn silage in the diet would be 28.5 (10 pounds/.35) pounds per head per day on an as-fed basis. Remember that of the 28.5 pounds of silage, xviii.5 pounds is h2o and 10 pounds is silage.
What Determines Daily Fodder Intake
At that place are a number of different factors that determine the daily intake of a cow. The chief factors are cow weight, forage quality, and stage of production (gestating or lactating). When feeding the same forage, cows that weigh 1,300 pounds volition swallow more on a daily basis compared to lighter weight cows that weigh 1,100 pounds. In addition, cows that are lactating volition eat more feed than cows that are not lactating.
Provender quality impacts dry matter intake of cows. As the forage quality increases, indicated as an increase in TDN content of the provender, the amount of the forage that the moo-cow tin swallow also increases. As forage quality increases, in that location is more leaf as compared to stem. When quality is low, at that place is more stem, therefore more than cell wall contents that are not every bit easily digested - the provender does not pass through the rumen very fast.
In improver, equally forages increase in maturity, there is an increase in lignin content. Lignin is non digested past the rumen microbes.
A adept example of how forage quality impacts the corporeality a moo-cow tin can eat daily is wheat straw. Wheat straw is low in protein and energy, iv.0% crude poly peptide and 40% TDN. When cows have full access to wheat straw, they don't quit eating wheat straw because they don't like it, they quit eating it considering they tin't stuff anymore into their rumen. Straw has such a low digestibility that it takes extra time in the rumen for it to be digested and passed through the rumen before more tin be consumed. Daily intake on a dry matter footing may be one.6% to 1.viii% of her trunk weight. In comparing, corn silage will typically be about 70% TDN and lactating beefiness cows can easily eat two.5% to 2.vii% of their body weight on a dry out thing footing of this feed.
There are some "thumb rules" to help gauge daily feed intake of cows on a dry matter basis consuming forages of differing quality when they are either gestating or lactating.
- When forage quality is depression (52% TDN or less) and cows are not lactating, they will consume 1.8% and lactating cows about 2.0% of their weight on a dry out matter footing.
- If the forage quality is boilerplate (TDN content betwixt 52% and 59%), non-lactating cows will consume about two.0% to 2.1.% and lactating cows about two.3% of their body weight daily on a dry matter footing of this provender.
As an example, if the fodder were 55% TDN and lactating cows on the boilerplate weigh 1,200 pounds, then it could be estimated that they would eat 28 (1200 pounds ten 0.023) pounds of hay daily on a dry out matter basis. If the hay were 88% dry thing, on an "equally-fed" basis, cows would swallow nigh 32 (28 pounds/.88) pounds daily. If there were 200 head of cows in the herd, it would take virtually 3.2 ton of this hay per day [(200 caput x 32 lb/hd/da)/2000lb] not accounting for any waste matter.
Estimating daily feed intake of your cow herd is the first step in determining the amount of forage that is needed to be on-hand for a harvested forage feeding program. When fodder availability is tight like it is during drought, being able to make up one's mind how much inventory needed will assistance enhance the profit potential of the cow/calf enterprise.
Rick Rasby
Beef Specialist
University of Nebraska
Source: https://beef.unl.edu/cattleproduction/forageconsumed-day
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