Great Basin Cattle Nutrition Research Programs: Strategies to Improve Nitrogen Utilization in Alfalfa Hay

The majority of ruminant livestock production occurs in temperate grasslands where animals are allowed to graze or are fed harvested forages (i.e., hays or silages). As a result, forages comprise 50 to 90% of total feed consumed by ruminants during their production cycle (Reid and Jung, 1982). In the U.S., beef cattle production is often viewed as an intensive enterprise because of finishing cattle on high-grain diets in the feedlot. In fact, this stage represents only a minor segment of the production cycle because more than 75% of the total feed units used by beef cattle in the U.S. consist of forages. This estimate is probably low because the contribution of grazing towards this figure is usually underestimated.