Tag: nutrition

This article is part of our series of original articles on emerging nutrition topics. Please check here to see other articles in this series.

Optimizing feed efficiency and income over feed costs on dairy farms is very important because feed is the highest cost associated with producing milk. Some of the primary dietary areas for achieving high feed efficiency are feeding high-quality forage, providing optimum balance of protein and carbohydrates for rumen health, and high digestibility of the cereal grains. …

This article is part of our series of original articles on emerging featured topics. Please check here to see other articles in this series.

The fact that the nutrient content of feeds varies is not news to anyone involved with dairy nutrition. However, many nutritionists do not consider why two samples of the same feed may have different composition. Variation in the composition of a feed can be partitioned into three major sources:

• analytical
• sampling
• true or real variation

Please …

This article is part of our series of original articles on emerging featured topics. Please check here to see other articles in this series.

Introduction

About 70% of typical diets for lactating dairy cows consist of carbohydrates, of which 37% are structural carbohydrates (neutral detergent fiber; NDF), 30% starch, and 3% simple sugars (free glucose, sucrose, fructose, and other minor sugars). Although each of these fractions is made up mostly of molecules of glucose, the nature of the chemical linkages …

This article is part of our series of original articles on emerging featured topics. Please check here to see other articles in this series.

The global human population is projected to increase from its current estimate of 7.1 billion to 9.4 billion by the year 2050. These projections are alarming because food production will have to double, and meeting such demand will be a challenge as arable land is limited. Meeting this demand will require increased efficiency of production in …

This article is part of our series of original articles on emerging featured topics. Please check here to see other articles in this series.

Introduction

The current Dairy NRC (2001) is largely based on data published before 2000. Although the book remains a valuable resource and much of its information is still relevant, few things remain constant. During the past decade, we have increased our knowledge about dairy cattle nutrition. Most of the new knowledge represents incremental modifications rather than …

This article is part of our series of original articles on emerging featured topics. Please check here to see other articles in this series.

Proper mineral nutrition of dairy cows is essential for high milk yields, efficient reproduction, and good health. Meeting the 2001 NRC requirements for dairy cows in most situations will result in adequate status for most minerals. However, for some minerals and some situations, NRC requirements are inadequate and additional supplementation will be necessary. Experiments conducted after …

This article is part of our series of original articles on emerging featured topics. Please check here to see other articles in this series.

Introduction

Dairy cows must follow the law of conservation of mass. What this means is that everything that goes into a cow must eventually come out. Nutrients consumed by a cow are secreted in milk, excreted in manure, or retained in the body (either in the cow or in her developing fetus). The nutrients secreted in …

Abstract

Problems associated with the measurement and monitoring of physical feed efficiency are reviewed. We propose targets for gross feed efficiency based on milk production and stage of lactation and present elements to diagnose possible causes when actual results depart from the proposed targets. This is followed by the development of a meaningful benchmark of economic feed efficiency based on market prices for milk components, amounts of major nutrients required for the production of these milk components, and market prices …