Amino Acids in Dairy Nutrition – Where Do They Fit?

As our understanding of the biology underlying specifics of protein nutrition for dairy cows has increased and systems utilized to formulate diets for dairy cows have become more sophisticated, more attention has been directed toward formulating diets on an amino acid basis. This makes sense because the tissues of the cow actually require amino acids for protein synthesis, rather than protein per se. The purpose of this paper is to provide some perspective to amino acid balancing together with the underlying biology supporting amino acid balancing and our current recommendations for amino acids in diets for dairy cattle.