Post by may1802 on Oct 25, 2016 20:18:56 GMT -5
We're trying to make some feed changes and would love some advice.
We've been milking for the last 3 1/2 years. We use rotational grazing with our livestock (+hay). During the winter, after they have cleared out the stockpiled grasses, we move them to a sacrifice paddock with free choice hay. We do not feed grain to our dry cattle, but we do feed a little grain at milking time (usually ~6#/cow per day) for those in milk. We also offer loose dairy minerals, loose salt, sometimes we feed kelp but are currently out of it, and we recently started adding nutritional yeast to their feed.
We'd like to get away from the store-bought dairy feed and have been reading up on our options. I'm fairly sold on the idea of fermenting. We do a good bit of fermenting for our family and we already ferment the grain for our american guinea hogs.
My preference would be to keep it as simple as possible. Is it possible to just choose 1 or 2 types of grains, ferment it and have a decent feed for them (+the above mentioned supplements) or is that little variety going to not give them what they need?
If so, which grain(s) would you choose?
A couple of places we looked at are a decent drive, but one has a feed with ground barley, corn and alfalfa (I don't know the ratios or each).
The other is a mix of corn and wheat. We also have a grain mill, not quite as far away, but the cost is higher per ton.
Ideally whatever we do with the fermented grains for the cows could also be used for our guinea hogs and our ducks, but I understand that might not work.
I've also read some about COB- does anyone know the ratios of each that is typically used?
Thanks for all your help and let me know if anything needs clarified
We've been milking for the last 3 1/2 years. We use rotational grazing with our livestock (+hay). During the winter, after they have cleared out the stockpiled grasses, we move them to a sacrifice paddock with free choice hay. We do not feed grain to our dry cattle, but we do feed a little grain at milking time (usually ~6#/cow per day) for those in milk. We also offer loose dairy minerals, loose salt, sometimes we feed kelp but are currently out of it, and we recently started adding nutritional yeast to their feed.
We'd like to get away from the store-bought dairy feed and have been reading up on our options. I'm fairly sold on the idea of fermenting. We do a good bit of fermenting for our family and we already ferment the grain for our american guinea hogs.
My preference would be to keep it as simple as possible. Is it possible to just choose 1 or 2 types of grains, ferment it and have a decent feed for them (+the above mentioned supplements) or is that little variety going to not give them what they need?
If so, which grain(s) would you choose?
A couple of places we looked at are a decent drive, but one has a feed with ground barley, corn and alfalfa (I don't know the ratios or each).
The other is a mix of corn and wheat. We also have a grain mill, not quite as far away, but the cost is higher per ton.
Ideally whatever we do with the fermented grains for the cows could also be used for our guinea hogs and our ducks, but I understand that might not work.
I've also read some about COB- does anyone know the ratios of each that is typically used?
Thanks for all your help and let me know if anything needs clarified