ABSTRACT
Objective
This experiment was conducted to evaluate performance (using 5 yr of data reported
here, and the additional 5 yr of results previously) and economic return (10 yr) of
steers grazing smooth bromegrass pastures over 10 consecutive years to determine profitability
and pasture longevity under 3 management strategies.
Materials and Methods
Treatments consisted of cattle (n = 450; 45/yr) grazing smooth bromegrass pastures
(n = 9/yr) fertilized with 90 kg of N/ha (FERT), unfertilized pastures stocked with
cattle that received distillers grains plus solubles (DGS) daily at 0.6% of BW (SUPP),
and unfertilized pastures stocked with cattle that received no supplement (control,
CON). A randomized complete block design was used each year with 3 treatments present
in each of 3 pasture blocks and treatments maintained in the same areas for all 10
yr.
Results and Discussion
Cattle supplemented daily with DGS had greater ADG (1.19 kg/d; P < 0.01) than those on the CON and FERT treatments (0.83 and 0.86 kg/d, respectively;
P = 0.44). Stocking rates for SUPP [10.95 animal unit months (AUM)/ha] and FERT (10.73
AUM/ha) cattle were similar to one another (P = 0.75) and greater than those for CON (6.72 AUM/ha; P < 0.01). Net returns were greatest (P < 0.01) for SUPP cattle ($146.56), with FERT ($130.04) and CON ($127.17) cattle being
similar (P = 0.62). In the current analysis, SUPP was the most profitable treatment in 7 of
the 10 yr, with FERT being the most profitable 2 yr and CON 1 yr.
Implications and Applications
Fluctuating market conditions and changes of input costs affect the overall profitability
of treatments and relative differences. In this scenario, holding all prices constant
except DGS, price of DGS would have to increase by 20% (increase of $43.29/908 kg)
in order for applying N fertilizer to pastures (FERT) or increasing stocking rate
(CON) to be more profitable than supplementing cattle with distillers grains (SUPP).
Key words
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Article info
Publication history
Accepted:
December 10,
2020
Received:
July 6,
2020
Footnotes
The authors declare no conflicts of interest.
Identification
Copyright
© 2021 American Registry of Professional Animal Scientists. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
