Supplementation Strategies to Reduce Waste in Beef Cattle Systems

Some often cited reasons why both grain and forage prices are and will continue to be high include utilizing corn for ethanol production and the pressure corn grain prices placed on shifting other crop and forage land to corn grain production. Yet, current times of increased income present an ideal opportunity to improve resource management. This will be necessary to permit continued profit under increased input costs and high volatility — the new norm in livestock production conditions. Since 2006, yearly variability (coefficient of variation) in corn grain prices recorded for NW Iowa (starting in October of the year) ranged from 8.4% to 20%. In the same period, variability in prices of dry distillers’ grains and for the same region ranged from 8.2% to 24%. Forage price and price variation were not immune to these changes. Prices and volatility of good and fair quality bermudagrass hay in the Southeast have been markedly affected since 2005 (Figure 1; https://www.marketnews.usda.gov/mnp/lshome).