Fly Control Mineral

[NolanCountyAG]

I've got 2 groups of cows, ~45hd per group. Mineral comes off the same pallet. One group goes through 150lbs about every 10 days. The other group is maybe 50lbs every 2 weeks. What gives? Do I need to add salt to get the second group to eat more?

 

[jedstivers]

I used to never put salt out, thought the mineral uptake wouldn't be right.
I use ADM minerals, the rep that calls on me told me to start putting out the salt. Said they will choose the one they are needing and get enough of what they need.

 

[cowgirl8]

I've got 2 groups of cows, ~45hd per group. Mineral comes off the same pallet. One group goes through 150lbs about every 10 days. The other group is maybe 50lbs every 2 weeks. What gives? Do I need to add salt to get the second group to eat more?

I never worry about the ones who dont eat as much as recommended..Its the ones who eat it too fast that i try to limit. I figure that its just a few greedy cows who eat the mineral up fast in specially one herd.
On the question about rats and if they chew the bags open, we will get a pallet of it and it sits outside under a shed. I cant recall ever grabbing a bag with a hole chewed in it. I know the times we've bought feed on pallets, something always chews a hole in a couple of them.

 

[cowgirl8]

Does anyone remember the mineral, or maybe it was protein with fish oil (was at the time i was raising kids and not working so much with cows, around 30 yrs ago)...But we would buy something or another, from a company that supplied the feeder. They'd haul it in filled. The stuff whatever it was, had fish oil in it. It was to limit how much the cows ate. Smelled terrible. I would think, when i got a whiff of it, that stuff must be pretty good for them to eat it with that fish oil in it.. Does anyone do that anymore? A lot of people fed it around us for a while, not sure why everyone quit.

 

[TexasBred]

Purina Accuration. Very good feed but extremely expensive.

 

[Debra Gann]

We use Wind and Rain. We keep it out year round, but the stuff with the fly control in it we started putting out in Feb, last year which was a very cold year so this year may be different. Our cows do not border any other herds outside our own. So i watched near by herds i knew werent getting any kind of fly control. After feeding it months, by around june, we were hit with flies with vengeance both years. We rarely spray our cows, but we had to get them up twice and spray for flies. Neighboring herds had flies just the same... This was the second year we've used it, and both years we had flies pretty bad.
We bought most of ours with a 15% off coupon at TSC by the pallet and got it for around $33 a bag.. I started mixing it with a little salt because the cows were eating it so fast. They require so many oz a day, but they were eating about a pound a day... I'd put a 50 pound bag out in a heard of less than 50 and they'd eat it in a few hours.. I started mixing part of a bag of white salt with it, and it'd last a couple days.

Don't use salt. Minerals have salt. They won't eat enough minerals..

 

[Josher]

I believe garlic is supposed to help repel flies once it gets into the blood stream. They have mineral blends with garlic added at the local coop. Doesn't kill them just keeps them off.