Feed Lingo by Mike Mehren Ph.D.

FEED LINGO
by Mike Mehren Ph.D.

It’s interesting to try to pick out special words used by people in different professions. A cattleman may use words like baldy, muley, or heifer and any other cattleman would know what they’re talking about. Feed industry members might throw out terms like crumbles, cake, bulk bags, or fines. Animal nutritionists also use terms such as by-pass protein, ash, or non-protein-nitrogen. To understand what a person from each group really means requires that we understand key terms in their context.

A place that many livestock owners encounter nutritional terms is in a feed analysis. This might be a good place to start defining some of these words or abbreviations.

One group that seems to cause a lot of confusion is the way energy is described. Basically all of the following measures refer to the calories in the diet. Calories are the fuel that your body or any animal’s body burns to maintain life, grow, run, or nurse. The higher the number, the greater the calories.

Unit of Measure	Fat	Oat Hulls
TDN Total Digestible Nutrients	204%	37%
N.E.l Net Energy for Lactation	2.20 Mcal/lb	35 Mcal/lb
N.E.m Net Energy for Maintenance	2.54 Mcal /lb	40 Mcal/lb
N.E. g Net Energy for Gain	1.88 Mcal/lb	.00 Mcal/lb

Each term has some advantages and disadvantages that aren’t appropriate for us to discuss in this column. They are not supposed to exactly relate to each other; however most labs and nutritionists use a formula or table to convert one to the other.

The table shows the feed with the highest concentration of calories, fat. Also shown is a by-product that is extremely low in calories, having about the same as wheat straw. Sometimes it is mistakenly purchased as an energy feed.

Several other terms relate to energy. These are compounds that make up the structure of the plant. They give it strength, and also line the cell walls.

Feed Component	Corn	Alfalfa Hay
NDF Neutral Detergent Fiber	10%	49%
ADF Acid Detergent Fiber	3%	36%
CF Crude Fiber	3%	30%

The greater the content of the above groups, generally the lower the calories. Some feeds throw us a curve because they are high in fiber, but still produce calories similar to grain. Feeds in this group are beet pulp with molasses, Soybean hulls, and wheat middlings. A table would show these feeds have an NDF about the same as alfalfa hay, but a much higher level of energy.

Ash also has an effect on energy content. Ash represents all of the inorganic matter in the feed. It can be beneficial minerals such as calcium, phosphorus, copper, or selenium as well as a variety of other minerals that aren’t needed by the animal. It can also include toxic minerals such as arsenic, lead, or cadmium. Ash has NO calories, protein, fiber, sugars, starch, or fat. A supplement containing added minerals would be much higher in ash than a grain. Some supplements may be 90% ash, such as trace mineral salt. If a harvested feedstuff such as grain or hay is high in ash, it generally indicates contamination with dirt. A typical ash content of a grain would be 3-4%, while that of hay would be 8-10%. Some of the screening products that are marketed have 15 to 20% ash because in the cleaning process the bits and pieces of grain as well as dirt particles have been removed from the grain. When hay is high in ash it usually has something to do with setting the height of the cutter and/or moles or gopher mounds.

Protein also is broken down into several types:

Crude Protein is simply a measure of the nitrogen in the feed sample. Most proteins Contain 16% nitrogen, so that fact allows the lab to estimate the protein in the sample.

DIP Protein: Digestible Intake Protein means that it is readily attacked and digested by the bugs in the paunch.

UIP Protein: Undigestible Intake Protein. This is similar to ‘By-Pass’ Protein as it escapes digestion by the bugs in the paunch.

DP Digestible Protein: Not used by nutritionists, but reported by some labs. May be inaccurate due to differences in excretion of microbial protein and host animal protein. Adjusted Crude Protein is a similar term
.
NPN Non-Protein-Nitrogen: This represents any compounds that have nitrogen that are not a true protein. This includes urea, biuret, and mono ammonium phosphate. It can also contain some plant compounds.

N03-N This is nitrate nitrogen: It is included in the crude protein fraction since it is made of nitrogen. Can be dangerous to livestock if feed contains an excess. Some feeds such as oat hay or sudangrass hay may be suspects for high nitrate, especially if they have been heavily fertilized with nitrogen. If you suspect high nitrates, this is how the many labs report what they have found.

If you feed silage or haylage, several terms might be important.

ADFIN ADF Insoluble Nitrogen (or protein): is an indication that the protein in the silage is bound to one of the ADF components and is not available to your animal. This occurs when silage heats excessively.

PH: This is used to measure acid and base. The scale goes from 1 to 14 with 7.0 being neutral. Numbers above that are alkaline or caustic such as lye and numbers below that are acid, such as acetic and other organic acids in feed. When silage fermentation goes properly the plants ‘pickle’ (acidify) themselves to a point where they are preserved. This is why silage lasts so long after it is put up and sealed against exposure to air. Once the pit or bag or silo of silage is opened, it starts to deteriorate. Different forages are stable at different pHs.

Examples would be:

Feed	pH
Corn silage	4.5 or less
Grass Silage	4.5 or less
Alfalfa Silage	5.1 or less

One last point: moisture is important because it is essential for life. It also plays a huge role in feed. Too much moisture allows feeds to spoil. For instance, corn having 20% moisture may heat, spoil, and allow toxic molds to grow. Hays can heat, mold, and catch fire if they are put up with too much moisture. Forages that are to be ensiled must have enough moisture to ferment properly. Too little moisture and they will rot.

These terms are all used to describe a feed. You may notice them in articles about a unique by-product or variety of forage. They are also part of a feed analysis. Hopefully this bit of information will help you make more sense of them, and determine whether the feed described might be useful in your operation.

Michael J. Mehren, Ph.D. is a livestock nutritionist from Hermiston, Oregon who defines entremanure as a cattleman when beef prices are high. He may be contacted by Email at mehrens@eotnet.net.