May 3,
2010
FOR
IMMEDIATE RELEASE
For more
information contact:
Laura
Nelson, Certified Angus Beef industry information specialist, lnelson@certifiedangusbeef.com or 330-345-2333
Healthy Cattle, Healthy
Profits
Beef cattle experts share expansive database on
feedlot health.
Treating
cattle for sickness in the feeding phase may be costing more than you thought.
“Of
course healthy cattle have lower treatment costs. But they also perform much
better in the yard and on the rail. That combination sets up the huge gaps
between who makes money feeding cattle and who doesn’t,” says Gary Fike, beef
cattle specialist for Certified Angus Beef LLC (CAB).
To be
exact, those factors lead to a $190 net difference between cattle treated twice
and those that never needed treatment.
Fike shed
light on the effect of health treatments on feedlot performance, carcass traits
and profitability at the Midwest section meetings of the American Society of
Animal Science last month. The information was drawn from Iowa Tri-County Steer
Carcass Futurity (TCSCF) data on nearly 50,000 head of cattle fed in 18 Iowa
feedlots since 2002.
Cattle
that remained healthy during the feeding phase had heavier delivery weights,
final weights, stronger gains and fewer days on feed than their treated
counterparts. Cattle that were never treated in the feedlot arrived weighing
650 pounds (lb.); those that ended up being treated once weighed 617 lb., and
those treated twice entered the yard at 601 lb.
“There’s
a lesson in those numbers,” Fike points out. “The cattle that were not treated
are a little older and heavier when they arrive, which tells me they spent more
time at home being backgrounded and getting all those sickness problems straightened
out before they ever left the ranch.”
Darrell
Busby, TCSCF manager, presented related research at the meetings. That study
focused on the cost of lung adhesions, which data revealed amounts to more than
$40 per head. Busby says that cost is the result of the same issues uncovered
in the study of health treatment costs.
“The
cattle with lung adhesions weigh 8 lb. less than those with none,” he says.
“That indicates there are a lot of things that happen prior to the feedlot that
cause these lung adhesions.”
In the
study, lung adhesions were defined as blemishes that require a knife to remove
the lung tissue from the ribcage of the carcass. “Our data is recognizing that
these severe cases of lung adhesions, which represent about 4% of the
population, are what cause the most damage in terms of lost performance,
lighter carcass weights and lower marbling scores,” Busby says.
Cattle
with lung adhesions had to be administered health treatments 2.2 times more
than those without. Similar to the data Fike presented, Busby says that hike in
treatment cost (nearly $7 more for individual drug treatments) isn’t the only
place cattle with lung adhesions lose.
The
percentage of carcasses that met Certified
Angus Beef ® (CAB®) brand acceptance dropped from 18%
to 12% when lung adhesions were present. A similar quality drop was found
between cattle never treated and those treated twice (19% vs. 11%).
“Those
healthy cattle lay on intramuscular fat more easily thanks to that added gain,”
Fike says. Noting the significant marbling deposition differences between
groups of cattle, he adds, “We know these stress-free, healthy cattle can
really bring home the carcass quality. A database of this size is just a big
exclamation point at the end of that statement.”
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