October 21, 2019 | Vol. 12 : No. 10
Producers can graze and harvest drought-stressed soybeans for baleage and hay, but they need to make careful considerations before doing so, says Chris Teutsch, extension forage specialist with the University of Kentucky (UK) College of Agriculture, Food and Environment.
There are two kinds of “lumpy jaw.” Soft-tissue abscesses caused by embedded foreign bodies, such as sharp grass seeds, are easy to treat by lancing, draining and flushing. However, a bone infection takes diligent effort to eradicate. Even treatment may not be successful.
Big temperature swings common during seasonal transitions can be stressful for cattle. That, combined with the stress of changing their environments, including weaning or mixing calves, opens the door for respiratory diseases to creep into your herd.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has given the green light to ultra-low gossypol cottonseed, ULGCS, to be used as human food and in animal feed, something Texas A&M AgriLife researchers have been working on for nearly 25 years.
From 2011 to 2015, bovine respiratory disease (BRD) in nursing calves cost the beef industry approximately $165 million each year. Of the bacterial causes of BRD, Mannheimia haemolytica is the most predominant and concerning of the group. Animals with an M. haemolytica infection can go from seemingly healthy to deceased in a day’s time.
Beef cattle producers could see greater profits in the finishing period with progressive limit-feeding, according to research from University of Illinois scientists. To help keep cattle healthy as they enter a feedlot, producers often feed less, or “limit-feed,” for a short time to allow the animal to adjust to the feedlot diet. The new research looks at the concept of progressively reducing feed intake throughout the diet-transition period, with the goal of maintaining a constant body size.
Maggie Smith, graduate assistant at Kansas State University, discusses the results of a study evaluating the effects of health and vaccination programs on prices paid for beef calves based on market data from Superior Livestock.
