Last week I attended both the Colorado Cattlemen’s Annual Convention and the Sandhills Ranch Expo at the Ward Laboratories Inc tradeshow booths.  At both locations, producers had concerns about nitrates.  The climate and weather however were contrasting conditions.  Colorado producers wondered how drought stress might affect the nitrate levels in their forages, while Nebraska and...Read More

Soon we will be entering forage grazing and harvesting season. Although many producers test their hay or silages when buying and selling, there is still a group who either only test for nitrate when they believe they may be having an issue or do not bother to test at all.  There are many benefits to...Read More

The function of carbohydrates in any animal’s diet is to provide energy.  Some carbohydrates are more easily digestible and provide energy to the animal, or in the case of the beef cattle, to the rumen microbes more rapidly.  These carbohydrates are Non-Fiber Carbohydrates (NFC). Examples of NFC are starch and sugars, such as glucose and...Read More

Baby calves are hitting the ground, and lush, green pastures ready for grazing, and grass tetany potentially.  Cattlemen know there’s a danger in those beautiful, green spring grasslands. A nutritional disorder known as Grass Tetany, Grass Staggers or Hypomagnesaemia.  Grass Tetany is a deficiency of magnesium that causes them to stagger, look alert and become...Read More

Intermittently, I receive a phone call asking me about the interpretation of a feed analysis for wild animals as opposed to domesticated livestock whose nutrient requirements I am more familiar with.  These phone calls usually make me do a little more research and I learn something new about animal nutrition with each inquiry. The first...Read More

The state of Nebraska is in the center of the High Plains Region of the United States.  The states that make up this region are Nebraska, Kansas, Colorado, Wyoming, and the Dakotas.  I checked the current drought monitor and found that southern Nebraska and southern Wyoming are abnormally dry, and Kansas, Colorado and the Dakotas...Read More

When it comes to hay testing, producers commonly grumble about the variation in Relative Feed Value (RFV) and protein content, based on their observations and what the lab reported. Producers often have these concerns, because the RFV determines the price of a forage and how much customers are willing to pay.  An underestimated RFV can...Read More

Integrated agriculture can benefit beef producers. Intensive, specialized crop production has several widely agreed upon downfalls.  These specialized systems tend to have stationary yields all while profitability is widely dependent on a global market over which we have little control.  Dependence on these practices  leads to reliance on fertilizers due to nutrient depletion  in the...Read More

How many of us producers have a shovel in our pickup? When was the last time we used that shovel to thoroughly examine our soil?  Are we able to determine what a truly healthy soil looks like? Grab a shovel and take a look at your soil. Check out your soil profile. Does the shovel...Read More

Grazing cover crops can be a cost-effective way to achieve multiple productions goals.  Cover crops can provide ground cover to prevent erosion, improve soil health over time, and provide nutrition to beef cattle.  However, cover crops are not a fool proof feed.  Turning cattle out onto cover crops to graze without proper feed tests can...Read More

Here in Central Nebraska we have experienced several mid-summer thunderstorms. These hail producing storms have wreaked havoc on crops and forage productivity, particularly in the Broken Bow and Ansley areas. As producers move forward with crop insurance, they will also be scrambling to utilize what is left of their standing row crops and forages. There...Read More