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Reducing feed costs

Reducing feed costs - Beef CRC - Beef Genetic Technologies

Associate Professor Wayne Pitchford
Program Manager, feed efficiency, maternal productivity and responsible resource use (08) 8303 7642 or Wayne.Pitchford@adelaide.edu.au

The Beef CRC has set about developing and commercialising multiple DNA tests and non-genetic treatments in a bid to reduce feed costs for the national beef herd.

Australia is a continent of droughts and flooding rains and as a result our farmers are at the mercy of the seasons. As a result there is a variable feed supply. Beef CRC scientists are aiming to breed more efficient cattle that can cope with that variation.

To do this, scientists are focussing on feed intake and maternal productivity.
The Beef CRC is trying to identify the DNA markers associated with feed efficiency in cattle.

It’s an expensive and time consuming process to record each animal’s feed intake and most bull breeders don’t do it.

The industry would like a breeding value for their animals based on DNA rather than on actual
measurement.

But scientists need to determine whether selecting animals with genes for improved feed efficiency affects other production traits.

That’s the focus of the CRCs “Maternal Productivity” project, being conducted in South and Western Australia.

Early work indicates selecting cattle for improved feed efficiency can lead to improved efficiency in steers and help improve the productivity of cows.

But this is extremely preliminary data and it is nowhere near enough to convince industry, or even ourselves, that we should be pushing for improved feed efficiency without fully knowing what consequences it will have on the lifetime productivity of the cow herd.

The Beef CRC wants to ensure feed efficient cows still have a calf every year, produce adequate milk and can store sufficient fat reserves over a number of years and varying nutritional environments.

What is the Maternal Productivity project? Find out here.

Another outcome from this program is reducing methane generation.

Cattle are among the biggest emitters of greenhouse gases in the world. It’s estimated livestock contribute more than 12 per cent of Australia’s greenhouse gases in the form of methane; put bluntly - burps and passing wind.

These gas emissions eliminate up to 10 percent of the energy consumed by an animal.

The CRC is working to decrease methane emissions from beef cattle by 20 per cent; and increase dietary energy captured for production by five-10 per cent.