Farmers Talk About Grain Feeding

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 31984, 10 May 1969, Page 8

Farmers Talk About Grain Feeding

The atmosphere was right for a field afternoon on grain feeding held by the Department of Agriculture at Ashwick, near Fairlie, this week. The snow was down to the bottom of the foothills nearby. To open the programme several farmers gave their personal experiences of the system.

“We do not regard grain as a total winter feed but as a high-quality supplement to our winter feed,” said Mr I. M. Gillies, on whose farm the field afternoon was held. He has been grain feeding for six years. "It is of consistently good quality from year to year.... So rather than making a surplus of hay we have our surplus in grain (oats in , our case) which we can use , during difficult conditions, , such as drought, snow dr wet, cold weather. “We try to grow 1200 to 1500 bushels of Mapua oats , each year. This is just to suit the size of our silos. This is sown in the spring after swedes or turnips and undersown with permanent pasture so as not to make any extra cultivation. | “Depending on whether we are short of low quality hay or not, we bale the straw for cattle. So if we get 80 to 100 bushels of grain and 50 bales of straw an acre and then grazing after the crop it is a fairly economical way to grow winter feed. “We usually start feeding grain in mid-July when the weather really starts to get cold and carry on right through till lambing. The ewes get most of the grain and start off with about lib a head for the first week and we gradually increase it to; a jib. At the same time they are also getting a proportion; of swedes. During rain or snow they get hay instead of swedes. <.. “As we get cjose to lambing the ration of grain is increased to lib a head or even more. ■ “The only time we have had trouble with sheep foundering with grain was when we were feeding turnips and grass and grain. Then it seemed we could only feed a jib of grain with this combination and only about lib With hoggets. “The hoggets are started off by putting a little grain in, troughs every three or four days and feeding out hay beside the troughs and they usually take at least two weeks to become educated to the grain. “I feel it would be too much work to feed all the sheep in troughs, as to allow

i a space of 6in a sheep a quarter of a mile of troughs would take a lot of laying out, moving, and also emptying out after snow, not to mention the cost of making them. “When feeding grain on the ground we try to feed it on the driest country and make use of the frozen ground in the mornings. We also try to confine it to a narrow line and not feed it out over a greater distance than is necessary for the sheep to get at the line—about 200 yards for 1000 ewes. This all helps to reduce waste." When later the visiting farmers inspected some of the equipment used, they were intrigued with the way a gumboot was used to direct grain from Mr Gillies’s hopper into a trough, Mr A. M. Evans, of Strathconan, said that they had been grain feeding for. four years. They were feeding 2500 ewes and 900 hoggets and whereas they normally started on June 1 they had already been going about a week this season. The hoggets were started off on grain in V-troughs. A little grain—about 2in—was put in the bottom and in this sort of trough they were able to see it and get at it A little salt was also put on the grain to encourage feeding. They took about two weeks to get used to it and they worked up to l/31b a day. Mr Evans said that twotooth ewes were kept separate from the Older ewes as the latter could get more than their share. The ewes started off at jib a day this year but normally they started at 11b. The oats and a bale of hay to 100 sheep were distributed in the morning and a similar quantity of hay was fed out again in the evening. All hay was fed and no straws. The feed was put out in . a • horseshoe line with the oats being put out first, then they ■ waited a few minutes before . feeding out the hay, which was done so that the sheep i did not have to leave the line. I This was long enough for all the sheep to get on it. The metal hopper or bin that is used to distribute the ’ feed is mounted on rubber-

tyred Wheels that are taken off the drill in the winter, and the quantity of feed being distributed from the hopper is checked each year by rune ning some grain into a sack. They were on clay downs country, he said, and in two years when they had grown. swedes they had been unable to feed them. Whereas they could grow enough oats on 35 acres for their requirements they would need 60 acres of swedes. On the pros and cons of feeding oats as compared i with barley, Mr Evans said , they could grow 100- bushels ’ plus of oats to the acre, -but ' only 75 bushels of barley. 1 Only small losses of hoggets from gorging and ewes ' from sleepy sickness had 1 been sustained, he said, and 1 the grain ration kept the ewes fit. ' Grain feeding of cattle on ' the property of Mr R. M. Patton at Middle Valley was described by Mr T. H. Donald- '■ son, a farm advisory officer ' of the Department of Agriculture at Fairlie. Mr Patton had been grain feeding 100 cattle during the winter for two years and this Winter would be feeding 150 weaner and 18 months old cattle. He normally started feeding cattle in June but this year because of the dry conditions he had started at the ' beginning of April. The ‘ usual practice was to intro- . duce the cattle to crushed , grain which had been moistened and to build up to a full ’ ration of 31b a day over two ' to four weeks, depending on 1 how the cattle were taking , it. It was essential not to over-feed at the outset. The crushed grain was fed ' out in troughs made of 44- ' gallon drums cut in half and one trough was allowed for ; seven to eight cattle. Hay at ' the rate of one bale to. 10 ’ was fed at the same time. ' For a start two buckets of grain were fed in the troughs for 30 calves. Mr Donaldson said that 1 crushing was an important part of grain feeding of cattle and Mr Patton felt this material should be used soon ' after crushing, otherwise it tended to go sour if left for ' a week or more. Usually two 1 days crushing was done at a time and this took five to 10 minutes. One of the prob- . lems with shifting the crushed 1 grain was that it packed down in the hopper and if it was i necessary to travel any dis- > tance -with it it could be ' hard to auger out To over- ! come this Mr Patton had fitted i an agitator to his bin—an i old water tank with an old . auger off a header, which Mr I Patton said had been made pp out of junk. i There was no problem in i getting all the cattle to eat • grain and after feeding the

i cattle were content to lie ’ . down. i i The whole operation of i i grain feeding 2000 sheep and ( 150 cattle took about an hour, with about 10 minutes every i . second day for crushing the . grain for the cattle. At pre- ’ . sent the ewes were being fed , hay one day and grain the < , next. ' The over-all stock health j situation under grain feeding . was better than under previJ ous systems. Ewes were more ‘ lively and generally fitter and : carrying less fat. The wool ‘ seemed to be of better quality, 1

with more character, and was i much cleaner than when < swedes were being fed. i Sheep, Mr Patton said, 1 would leave swedes to feed on grain. The final farmer speaker was Mr W. B. Trotter, of Fairlie, to whose operation reference was made on these pages I last year. On his 500 acres property, | Mr Trotter first went into , grain feeding as an insurance , against having to face the - store cattle market in periods , of drought. He could not see , why it was necessary to take ,

a hiding with cattle in a drought when he was living in the granary of the country. Now wintering stock, including 500 cattle, be said he believed that an acre - of grain would winter more stock and do them better than any crop of brassicas. Mr Trotter said he spread lime with his grain once a week, and on country that was magnesium deficient he also used a little powdered molasses and his cattle also received selenium once a ' month. Mr E. C. Orr, a livestock instructor at Fairlie, said that on nearly all properties in the district where large numbers of pigs were being run a disease had been isolated that was due to selenium deficiency in cereals, and he suggested that as this had appeared in one class of stock it was something that should be watched for. Mr Patton said that he always had rock salt available to his stock. Mr Trotter said he believed there would be 90 per cent wastage of grain if it was not crushed before feeding to cattle. And where cattle were fed grain he thought they ate only about a quarter of the grass they did previously. He looks on oats as a feed to make stock grow and barley as a fattening ration.