The Future of Alfalfa Forage Quality Testing in Hay Markets

Forage quality testing defines the language of value between the dairy and forage sector. From a nutritionist’s viewpoint, forage quality consists of many analyses that, together, provide a prediction of performance in a balanced ration for the dairy cow. Marketing systems, on the other hand, require a few simple criteria that can be related to value and price discovery. Currently, most trading systems for alfalfa hay are ‘fiber-based’ marketing systems, since they depend solely upon the concentrations of ADF and NDF in the forage, even though RFV and TDN are calculated. This ‘fiber-based’ marketing system fails to account for important quality factors, especially when severe market penalties are given for small changes in ADF or NDF concentration. While it may be difficult to incorporate additional analyses into marketing, it is important to do so, since important attributes of forage of often missed. NDFD is becoming increasingly important to dairy nutritionists. Ash content would be helpful, since it contains zero energy and differs widely across samples. Marketing systems based first upon NDF, and then upon NDF digestibility, CP, Ash, or other measurements may assist in differentiating hay products. Continued emphasis on lab consistency is needed as these become more widely used..