Author :Dr Jacob Gusha (Ph.D)

Introduction to Stalklage and Haylage

Introduction

The high producing dairy cow requires a diet that supplies the nutrient needs for high milk production. Carbohydrates, amino acids, fatty acids, minerals, vitamins, and water are all nutrients required by the lactating dairy cow to meet the demand by the mammary gland to produce milk and milk components. However, not everything that is eaten is degraded or digested to provide the nutrients required for milk production.

Degradability and Digestibility measurement.

Not all the feed an animal eats is degraded, digested and assimilated. The part that is not digested will leave the body as faeces and is not used by the animal. The digested part of the feed can be expressed as a percentage of the total feed intake. This percentage is called the digestibility coefficient and can vary from as little as 0 to100 % depending on the type and structure of a feed. Depending on the feedstuff the digestibility may vary a lot. Some products such as most feeds of animal origin, young grass and other green forages are very easily digested (high digestibility coefficient) while other products such as dry season harvested hay, cereal straw and chaff are difficult to digest (low digestibility coefficient). Other factors which might influence the digestibility of a feedstuff are shown in Figure 1.

Feed requirements for various categories of dairy animals.

Feeding a dairy cow is through making more bugs – Microbial Protein. One of the greatest gift men got from God is the cattle. The cow turns poor quality feeds into high-quality milk for human beings. Milk is not deficient in any nutrient and is key to the survival of all young animals. Unfortunately, dairy farmers still do not appreciate and want to feed dairy cows with human food yet cows are well adapted to a herbage diet.

Billions of bacteria are found in the rumen.

They ferment or degrade about 70 to 80% of all digestible dry matter in the rumen. The cow derives a majority of its energy and protein from microbial end products. Different species of bacteria perform different functions. Some ferment starch and sugars while others digest cellulose. The diet of the cow determines the numbers and proportions of each type of microbe.

Maintaining a healthy mixture of different microbes is very important for keeping the rumen functioning efficiently. Diet upsets, such as feeding too much grain too quickly, can cause changes in microbial population and species. These changes are detrimental to fibre digestion and dry matter intake. In other words, the more we make microbes in the rumen reproduce and grow the less additional, more expensive feedstuffs such as concentrates we need to provide to the cow’s diet.

The principal objective of dairy cow feeding should be to maximise microbial protein production and then to meet additional cows’ nutrient demands over and above those met by microbial fermentation end products.

Rumen microbes are the major source of protein in the cow’s diet. The microbes also convert non-protein nitrogen sources such as poultry litter, Mabiko K, and Urea to ammonia which they use in microbial protein production.

Definitely, this type of feeding approach would be the most economical and efficient

Table 1: Microbial Protein Synthesis Relative to daily protein needs of the cow