CALF_News_August_September_2020

19 CALF News • August | September 2020 • www.calfnews.net Creative:Clients:Micronutrients:1500-26147 2020 Beef Print Ads:1500-26147 2020 Beef Print Ad_Calf News_7.25 x 4.875_v13.indd.indd May 11, 2020 8:27 AM Still feeding sulfate trace minerals? How distasteful. www.micro.net | (317) 486-5880 1 Wiebusch. 2015. JAM. 2 Caramalac et al. 2017. J. Anim. Sci. 95:1739-1750. 3 Micronutrients trial #2017BC106USCZM. IntelliBond ® is a registered trademark of Micronutrients, a Nutreco company. © 2020 Micronutrients USA, LLC. All rights reserved. Smart minerals, smart nutrition... smart decision Calves prefer the taste of supplements with IntelliBond ® more than 2 to 1 vs. sulfate trace minerals. 1-3 Did you know cattle have 25,000 taste buds? That makes them extra-sensitive to the bad taste of free metals from sulfate trace minerals in the ration, and causes them to consume less feed. But when you feed IntelliBond ® trace minerals instead, calves keep eating. Studies show calves prefer supplements that include IntelliBond ® more than 2 to 1 vs. sulfate trace minerals . 1-3 Ask your nutritionist about the tastier trace mineral option. Learn more at micro.net/species/beef. would have been,“but getting there by a very erratic path.” Hold ‘em Another issue for some feedlots was feed, depending on whether they made a change in the ration to try to slow the rate of gain.“Presumably, the cattle that are backed up are being held back in growth a little, but still getting bigger,” Peel says.“Coming into all this, we had bigger cattle with higher carcass weights. Feed was fairly cheap, and then as we got into backed-up supply, carcass weights kept going up. “Looking at carcass weights com- pared to a year ago, we’re slaughtering the equivalent of more cattle than at this time last year. Steer carcass weights are running 52 pounds heavier than a year ago and heifers about 43 pounds heavier,” he says. On several thousand head, that’s the equivalent of a lot more beef coming through the system. Carcass weights in the second half of the year will be one of the measures to tell us when we’re starting to get current again, and back into line with what we normally expect seasonally. During the market slowdown, gaso- line prices were dropping, prompting the shutdown of ethanol plants across the country and a shortage of dried distiller’s grains. Feedlots had to reformulate rations utilizing something else. Continued on page 20  The one positive for feedlots is that cost of gain should stay fairly attractive, maybe better than it has been.