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Courtesy of Kent's Beef Producer News There are several worthwhile points to consider when relating protein quality, source and implant strategy. Some research-which is not necessarily new-offers us useful insight. These trial results appeared in the 1992 Iowa State University Beef Feeder Day report (Table 1). It evaluates crude protein (CP) levels of 9.5, 11.0, 12.5, and 14.0 percent, fed during the first 85 days of the feeding period. As you can see, increasing protein from 9.5% to 11.0% increased ADG by about 0.1 lb, and an additional 0.1 lb by going from 11.0% to 12.5% Crude Protein. You can also see, feeding each additional level of protein to implanted cattle gave an even larger response. The implant in this case was a combination of Finaplix and Synovex, which by today's standards would be the same as using Revalor. The first portion of this trial is basically telling us that you can enhance performance by feeding higher levels of protein, but you usually don't get the feed intake to achieve the optimum response until you implant the cattle. One might also conclude by looking at the performance of the implanted cattle fed the 14% protein diet, that implanting with Revalor may actually increase their protein requirement. The second portion of this trial is shown in Table 2. The first three treatments shown were cattle that were not implanted during the first phase of the total trial. You can see that you get some "compensatory" gain from not implanting in phase I, but you do not get the total gain back in the finishing phase unless you move the protein up to 14% (compare treatment II to treatment III). You can also see by looking at treatment IV compared to treatment V, that implanting alone does not seem to give the total response when only an 11% protein diet is fed. Finally, treatment VI shows that following a Revalor implant with Synovex and feeding only an 11% protein diet during the finishing phase does not do justice to the feeding system. Some may look at this treatment and say we lose what we gained with Revalor, but rather, we have set up heavy cattle going into the final phase and then given them a less aggressive implant with less protein to back it up. The last treatment fed a 14% protein diet all the way through and used Revalor twice. You need to look at your cattle to determine if that will suit the weight you want to sell. I recommend for 200-day cattle, implant with Synovex for the first three months and feed a 12-12.5% protein diet, then use Revalor for the terminal implant and feed a 13-13.5% protein diet. |
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