A Nutritional Guide to Feeding Pacific Northwest Barley to Ruminants

The University of Idaho provides equal opportunity in education and employment on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, age, disability, or status as a Vietnam-era veteran, as required by state and federal laws. 1 Malting barley is the most valued variety of barley. However, growing conditions for malt-ing barley may result in a substandard quality that is unsuitable for use by the malting industry. This grain can be marketed as livestock feed. Such malting barley may have a less plump kernel, resulting in less starch and higher protein content than the high value malting barley used by the malting industry. Feed grade barley is normally sold on a test weight basis and the associated visual appraisal. Each grade of barley is characterized by its skinned and/or broken kernels, damaged kernels , foreign materials (wild oats, chaff, and other foreign material), test weight (weight/ volume), barley variety, and black barley content (Wilson 1985). There are minimum and maximum limits established for each grade. Nutrient composition should be an integral part of the evaluation process for barley, but it is not currently used in the grading system. Differences in nutrient content may affect the feeding value of barley for non-ruminant animals, but are probably of lesser importance for ruminant animals. Barleys from different sources are very diverse in their composition, especially in their protein and energy levels. There are varietal, geographical, and annual differences in composition. This has created some difficulties for nutritionists in formulating diets for livestock, Northwestern and other cool climate areas in the United States and Canada produce barley for human and livestock consumption. Barley is highly competitive with other agronomic crops in yield and market value in these cooler climates. Therefore, barley production has increased in importance in these regions as a crop for farmers to help manage their rotational cropping system. Barley varieties, like other cereal grains, have been developed by plant breeders for their climatic conditions, thus yielding barley of high economic and feeding or malting value. Barley accounts for about 5% of the feed grains or 3% of the concentrates consumed by U.S. livestock (Ash 1992). In the Pacific and mountain regions, barley is the base feed grain for cattle and sheep diets in feedlot operations. Barley in these rations has about 95% (pound for pound) of the energy content of corn. However, its protein content (approximately 11%) is considerably higher than corn …