I am fixing to start wind rain and fly control minerals this week. What type of mineral blocks do you think my cows need. All are grown and some are pregnant. I fed a 200 lb tube of 27% protein tub to them last week. 8 of them ate it in a week. Just want the best salt/copper/sulfur mineral blocks available. There are so many different types at tractor supply co.
Mineral blocks
- Thread starter Tomcolvin
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M-5
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forget the blocks and stick with the loose wind and rain mineral and put out loose salt also.
Coosh71
Well-known member
M-5 said:
We switched to loose salt and mineral a while back. It's pricey, but I like the results. I build my own mineral feeders with an 8' trough and roof overhead. So far it has kept majority of rain/snow out and our cattle/calves seem to be getting as much as they want without licking the blocks forever. We can add fly control to the loose mineral, added mag or whatever we want. And we do still hand cattle rubs off them also. Bulls and cows rub their faces on the rubs. All and all helps keep flys down.
Jeanne - Simme Valley
Well-known member
A block does not contain enough of anything to supply one cow with her needs - even if she ate the whole thing in 1 day. It is just a passifier of time.
Silver
Well-known member
Jeanne - Simme Valley said:
To say that you'd actually need to know exactly what the "needs" are. It is entirely possible it does supply her with her needs depending on what the cow is getting from her diet.
I would want to have a specific need(s) if I were going to spend money on loose mineral, and formulate for that need.
Jeanne - Simme Valley
Well-known member
Silver - I think you must live in an extremely fertile virgin type land. No land South of your border (that I know of) has enough of the micro minerals to keep your cattle working at maximum production. Most land is extremely SE deficient.
Silver
Well-known member
Jeanne - Simme Valley said:
That could well be. But my point is that unless you test and know not only what you are short of, but what you are high in you are playing a guessing game that can turn out poorly in terms of cost and health. If I thought I had a mineral shortage in my herd I would test the feed and have a custom mix made at the advise of an expert. If I were to just throw out mineral the door is open to one mineral tying up others and so forth. I don't think it's as simple as buying a bag of what's popular and thinking we are doing our herd any favours.
backhoeboogie
Well-known member
My experience is that if you put out loose minerals, and the cows go thru it quickly, they are likely deficient. Once they regulate, they taper off and minerals last much longer.
Point is, most mineral blocks are 97 % salt. So a 50 lb block has 1 1/2 pounds of mineral. Not enough to do the cow any good. If you are using a mineral block as a salt block, no problem. If you are looking to supplement your cows minerals, blocks are not the best option. Hence, I agree with Jeanne
This thread was discussing cow supplement. They mentioned TSC. Read the contents on the blocks at TSC
Point is, most mineral blocks are 97 % salt. So a 50 lb block has 1 1/2 pounds of mineral. Not enough to do the cow any good. If you are using a mineral block as a salt block, no problem. If you are looking to supplement your cows minerals, blocks are not the best option. Hence, I agree with Jeanne
This thread was discussing cow supplement. They mentioned TSC. Read the contents on the blocks at TSC
Ebenezer
Well-known member
jehosofat said:
Dentist probably told them to avoid hard foods. :lol:
Silver
Well-known member
backhoeboogie said:
According to Jason K. Ahola, Ph.D. | Apr 07, 2008
From https://www.beefmagazine.com/americancowman/beef-and-business/0407-trace-minerals-supplement :
It is also important to understand that contrary to popular belief, animals are not able to voluntarily determine which minerals they are lacking, and can't modify their consumption behavior based on physiological need.
snoopdog
Well-known member
That's a good article, thanks. Mineral supplementation is a high cost for us, be interesting to know if they can check levels through a blood preg check sample.Silver said:
We keep out salt and mineral blocks along with a quality loose mineral and either an iodine block or a loose salt with Eddi in it. It has worked well for us. Consumption of each varies. I'm still a believer that they consume what they need.
backhoeboogie
Well-known member
Silver said:
Silver you can just skip mineral supplement if you choose.
Most of the TSC blocks are 97% salt.
My statement remains. Cows surge to it for a while. Then they taper way off.
JMJ Farms
Well-known member
snoopdog said:
I'd be interested in knowing the best/easiest/cheapest (probably no such thing as all three in one) way to test for mineral deficiency as well, and have a mineral custom mixed to meet my cows needs. Good chance it would be very enlightening.
Rydero
Well-known member
Know people who've had it done by testing blood. One was a breeder having scour issues even though they were using scour vaccine and the drug company paid to do testing to find out the problem. Turned out to be copper deficiency. Another was losing calves turned out to be Selenium deficiency. The rep from one feed company told me they pulled blood on cows and specially formulated their mineral for this area. Then they got bought out by a bigger feed company so who knows where that's at now.
JMJ Farms
Well-known member
Rydero said:
Can you pull your own sample and send it to a private lab? Or does this require a veterinarian?
Rydero
Well-known member
JMJ Farms said:
In both these cases vets were involved so not sure about that. I suspect you would need a vet. Private lab might not know what levels to look for etc if they don't see enough of those types of test. That's a guess. The one where the drug company was paying they had their own vets very involved because they were worried their vaccine wasn't effective and wanted to know why.
