Row crop waste a possible benefit to beef cattle farmers
It may provide better quality meat in the process, too.
The Southwest Research and Extension Center in Hope conducted a study that showed a high-byproducts diet, including soybean hulls and other plant waste materials, provided the best meat quality among three diets tested.
“Cattle producers are looking for alternative methods to finish their cattle and successfully diversify their operations through direct marketing of their products to consumers,” said Daniel Rivera, associate professor of animal science and director of the Southwest Research and Extension Center for the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture.
Cattle is a significant agriculture sector in Arkansas. There were 1.57 million cattle and calves in the state at the start of the year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA).
Arkansas ranks 11th among all states in terms of cattle production. About 43% of the state’s more than 13 million farm acres are used in cattle production and hay growing, according to the Arkansas Farm Bureau. Cash receipts within the sector totaled $687 million in 2022, the latest year data was available.
Demand for beef is at record highs while inventories are low and that is what has been driving market pressures in recent years.
Nearly 53% of the more than 37,000 farms in the Natural State produce cattle. The average herd in the state has 43 cattle.
Rivera said the research team wanted to know the feasibility of keeping “feeder” cattle on the pasture with a high-energy supplement to achieve results comparable to those at feedlots. In the process, they would calculate the cost and measure the impact of different diets. Feeder cattle are weaned calves that have reached a weight between 600 to 800 pounds.
The study stems from supply chain setbacks for meat supply during the COVID-19 pandemic and passage of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security or CARES Act, which opened alternative markets for cattle producers. The research was funded in part by a grant from the Arkansas Beef Council.
“Arkansas is not typically a cattle finishing state,” Rivera said. “We don’t have that infrastructure here like they do out West and in the Midwest. A lot of local producers had an interest in finishing cattle, but they didn’t have the background or the knowledge base to do it correctly.”
Rivera said the study showed that cattle can be fed in pasture and finished in a similar amount of time as cattle fed at a feedlot, with no negative effect on quality. The study took place in 2023 and evaluated the effects of three diets on weight-gain performance, carcass quality and meat characteristics of 63 locally sourced crossbred feeder steers, which are young males that have been castrated.
The feeder steers weighed on average 796 pounds at the start of the study. They were divided by body weight, fed assigned diets for 161 days and weighed every 28 days before being shipped to a commercial slaughter facility in Arkansas City, Kan. Rivera said the facility was used to accommodate the higher number of cows than could be processed at a local facility in a timely manner. The cost of transportation to the facility in Kansas was not accounted for in the study because it was irrelevant to the scenario.
Three diets were tested. The first was a conventional feedlot finishing diet with roughage which included 10.9% Bermuda grass hay, 56.2% cracked corn, 30% corn gluten feed and 2.9% mineral mix. The second was a high-starch supplement fed at 2 to 2.25% of body weight, with free access to Bermuda grass pasture, 50% cracked corn, about 21.6% corn gluten feed, 24.5% dried distiller’s grains with solubles, 2.9% mineral mix and 1% limestone for calcium. The third was a high-byproduct supplement fed at 2 to 2.25% of body weight with free access to Bermuda grass pasture, 14.8% cracked corn, 21.9% corn gluten food, 21.9% dried distiller’s grains with solubles, 38% dry soybean hulls, 2.9% mineral mix, and 0.5% limestone.
“The reason we chose to test the byproduct diet is because it is more user-friendly,” Rivera said. “Most producers wouldn’t run the risk of acidosis or some of the problems that you might see with a high-starch diet that is found in a lot of feedlot type diets.”
The hull of a dry mature soybean contains about 85% carbohydrates and 9% protein. Acidosis is when the cow’s digestive system pH is lower than normal and can lead to a lack of appetite, increased breathing and sometimes death.
Rivera said the results of all three diets were statistically similar, with the average weight increasing from about 800 pounds to 1,200 pounds throughout the study. However, the high-byproduct diet offered the best economic return whether the calf was purchased outright or born on the farm.
The percentage of beef that was “USDA Choice” quality grade or higher was 80% with the high-byproduct diet, 66% with the conventional feedlot diet, and 62% on the high-starch supplement diet. “Choice” is second to “Prime” in the USDA’s beef quality grading system, which is a measure of palatability of beef, or eating quality. Quality grades are a combination of marbling, which is the fine, small flecks of fat in the steak and maturity, which is how old cattle are at the point of harvest.
“Preliminary performance data shows that we were able to indeed produce a high-quality product,” Rivera said. “They were pretty similar in terms of their body weight and quality.”
The high-starch diet offered the lowest carcass value per head at about $1,958. The conventional feedlot diet provided the second-highest value at $2,021.85 per head, and the high-byproduct diet offered the highest carcass value per head at $2,065.89.
Rivera said the cost of increasing the weight of a weaned calf from about 750-800 pounds to a finished weight of about 1,200 pounds was approximately $550 per head for all three treatments.
“If you’re a producer and you’re wanting to start this endeavor, this gives you a blueprint that shows it’s going to cost roughly $500 to $600 per head to get from point A to point B,” Rivera said.