Traditional advice has recommended that fields for first cut silage should not be grazed after the turn of the year. This increases costs of production and reduces animal performance . Current advice is therefore to turn cattle out early to initially graze silage fields. The priority for grassland management is to make sufficient cheap silage to overwinter stock . By-product feeds, cereals etc are now a cheaper source of energy compared to grass silage.
Feed is the biggest cost for finishing cattle .
On many units today fixed costs per kg liveweight gain are greater than feed costs per kg at between 30 - 50p per kg. Fixed costs are fixed . Fixed costs are not fixed . Feed for finishing cattle must be mixed to achieve the best results. Trials at SAC have shown that finishing cattle offered a hopper of ad lib cereals and another hopper of mineralised protein had identical growth rates and feed conversion efficiency compared to animals offered the same feeds in a single, pelleted total mixed ration.