- Also called:
- animal feed
- Related Topics:
- pasture
- bone meal
- roughage
- mangel-wurzel
- concentrate
Feed
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What does 'feed' mean in agriculture?
In agriculture, "feed" refers to food specifically grown or developed for livestock and poultry. Modern animal feeds are carefully formulated to provide highly nutritional diets that maintain animal health and improve the quality of end products like meat, milk, or eggs.
Animal feeds are often classified into two basic types:
* Concentrates, which are high in energy, including cereal grains and their by-products, high-protein oil meals, and by-products from processing sugar beets, sugarcane, animals and fish.
* Roughages, which include pasture grasses, hays, silage, root crops, straw, and cornstalks.The basic nutrients that animals require from feed include carbohydrates, protein, fat, minerals, vitamins, and water.
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Why do farmers need to use feed for animals?
Farmers use animal feed to provide their livestock with the essential nutrients required for maintenance, growth, reproduction, and overall health. These nutrients include carbohydrates, protein, fat, minerals, vitamins, and water.
Animals require energy for life processes and muscular activity, with carbohydrates and fats serving as primary energy sources. When an animal's energy intake surpasses its needs, the surplus is stored as body fat for later use. Additionally, feeds ensure animals receive sufficient minerals like salt, calcium, and phosphorus, which are vital for bone, milk, and eggshell production. Modern feeds are carefully formulated to optimize nutrition, which improves animal health and the quality of meat, milk, or eggs.
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What are the main types of animal feed?
Animal feeds are generally classified into two main types: concentrates and roughages.
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Concentrates are high in energy value and include cereal grains and their by-products, high-protein oil meals, and by-products from processing sugar beets, sugarcane, animals, and fish.
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Roughages include pasture grasses, hays, silage, root crops, straw, and stover. Hay is produced by drying grasses or legumes to reduce moisture content and prevent spoilage. Straws from wheat, oats, barley, and rice crops can also feed cattle and other ruminants.
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How are animal feeds made or prepared?
Animal feeds are classified as concentrates and roughages. Concentrates, which have high energy value, include cereal grains and their by-products, high-protein oil meals or cakes, and by-products from processing sugar beets, sugarcane, animals, and fish. Roughages include pasture grasses, hays, silages, root crops, straw, and cornstalks.
Grains intended as animal feed are harvested and dried to a moisture content of 14% or less to prevent spoiling. They are then stored in containers or buildings to protect them from insects and rodents.
The basic nutrients that animals require include carbohydrates, protein, fat, minerals, vitamins, and water. When the energy intake of an animal exceeds its requirements, the surplus is stored as body fat, which can be utilized later as a source of energy if less food becomes available.
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How does the quality of feed affect animal health and growth?
The quality of feed significantly impacts animal health and growth. A balanced diet containing carbohydrates, protein, fat, minerals, vitamins, and water is essential for maintenance, growth, reproduction, and overall health.
Specifically, energy is primarily derived from carbohydrates and fats, while proteins are crucial for muscle growth and tissue repair. Minerals such as calcium and phosphorus are vital for bone, milk, and eggshell production, and deficiencies can lead to diseases like goitre. Additionally, trace minerals like copper and cobalt are needed for hemoglobin formation, preventing anemia.
Poor-quality feed can lead to various health issues, including digestive problems, ulcers, and liver abscesses. Therefore, providing high-quality feed is crucial for maximizing animal health, growth, and productivity.
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What challenges do farmers face when providing feed to their animals?
Farmers face several challenges in providing adequate feed to their animals. The essential nutrients that animals need include carbohydrates, protein, fat, minerals, vitamins, and water.
Some challenges include:
* Nutrient Deficiency Farm animals need common salt regularly, and they often lack phosphorus and calcium, which are needed for bones, milk, and eggshells. In some regions, soil and forage are deficient in copper and cobalt, which are needed for red blood cell formation, causing anemia in farm animals unless corrected with mineral supplements.
* Feed Storage Grain needs to be dried to 14% or less moisture to prevent sprouting or molding and then stored where insects and rodents cannot destroy it. Inefficient storage can make cereals vulnerable to insects and rodent attacks. Respiration of the grain can also be a danger.
* Environmental Concerns The production of corn and soy for animal feed has environmental costs, such as the consumption of fossil fuels due to the use of farming equipment, fertilizer manufacturing, corn transportation, and feed formulation.
* Animal Health The grain provided in feedlots is not the optimal diet for cattle, as they evolved to eat grass. The consumption of grain changes the pH and microflora in the gut, which can cause ulcers and liver abscesses.5 Britannica SourcesCreated from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.
Feed, food grown or developed for livestock and poultry. Modern feeds are produced by carefully selecting and blending ingredients to provide highly nutritional diets that both maintain the health of the animals and increase the quality of such end products as meat, milk, or eggs. Ongoing improvements in animal diets have resulted from research, experimentation, and chemical analysis by agricultural scientists.
Animals in general require the same nutrients as humans. Some feeds, such as pasture grasses, hay and silage crops, and certain cereal grains, are grown specifically for animals. Other feeds, such as sugar beet pulp, brewers’ grains, and pineapple bran, are by-products that remain after a food crop has been processed for human use. Surplus food crops, such as wheat, other cereals, fruits, vegetables, and roots, may also be fed to animals.
History does not record when dried roughage or other stored feeds were first given to animals. Most early records refer to nomadic peoples who, with their herds and flocks, followed the natural feed supplies. When animals were domesticated and used for work in crop production, some of the residues were doubtless fed to them.
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The first scientific effort to evaluate feeds for animals on a comparative basis was probably made in 1809 by the German agriculturist Albrecht von Thaer, who developed “hay values” as measures of the nutritive value of feeds. Tables of the value of feeds and of the requirements of animals in Germany followed and were later used in other countries.
Preservation of green forages such as beet leaves and corn (maize) plants by packing them in pits in the earth has long been practiced in northern Europe. The idea of making silage as a means of preserving and utilizing more of the corn plant was gradually developed in Europe and was taken from France to the United States in the 1870s. When the mature, dried corn plant was fed to cattle in the winter, much of the coarse stem was wasted, but when it was chopped and ensiled (made into silage), everything was eaten. During the 20th century, concrete bunker silos for storage of silage became a common sight in many rural areas worldwide.
Basic nutrients and additives
The basic nutrients that animals require for maintenance, growth, reproduction, and good health include carbohydrates, protein, fat, minerals, vitamins, and water. The energy needed for growth and activity is derived primarily from carbohydrates and fats. Protein will also supply energy, particularly if carbohydrate and fat intake is inadequate or if protein intake exceeds the needs of the body.
Animals need a source of energy to sustain life processes within the body and for muscular activity. When the energy intake of an animal exceeds its requirements, the surplus is stored as body fat, which can be utilized later as a source of energy if less food becomes available.
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Proteins
For immature animals, protein is also needed for growth of the muscles and other parts of the body. Since milk, eggs, and wool contain much protein, additional amounts are needed in the feed of animals producing these. All animals require a small amount of protein for maintenance—i.e., the daily repair of muscles, internal organs, and other body tissues.
Proteins are composed of more than 20 different amino acids, which are liberated during digestion. Animals with a simple single stomach (monogastric), including humans, monkeys, swine, poultry, rabbits, and mink, require correct amounts of the following 10 essential amino acids daily: arginine, histidine, isoleucine, leucine, lysine, methionine, phenylalanine, threonine, tryptophan, and valine. In addition to these, poultry need glycine and glutamic acid for growth. Cystine can replace up to half of the methionine requirement, and tyrosine can replace up to half of the phenyalanine requirement. High-quality protein, such as that supplied by eggs, milk, fish meal, meat by-products, and soybean meal, contains high concentrations of the essential amino acids in the proper balance for their full utilization. Poor-quality protein, such as that in most grains, including corn, barley, and sorghum, contains too little of one or more essential amino acids. Feeds having poor-quality proteins are useful when blended with other feeds that restore the balance in essential amino acids.
A protein source’s amino acid profile is of secondary importance to ruminants, such as cattle, sheep, goats, and the other animals that have four stomachs, because the bacteria that aid in the digestion of food in the rumen (first stomach) use simple nitrogen compounds to build proteins in their cells. Further on in the digestive tract, the animals digest the bacteria. By this indirect means, ruminants produce high-quality protein from a food that might originally have contained poor protein or from urea (a nitrogen compound). Very young ruminants, such as calves, lambs, and kids, however, need good-quality protein until the rumen develops sufficiently for this bacterial process to become established.
Carbohydrates and fats
Most animals get energy from carbohydrates and fats, which are oxidized in the body. These yield heat, which maintains body temperature, furnishes energy for growth and muscle activity, and sustains vital functions. Animals need much more energy (and more total feed) for growth, work, or milk production than for simple maintenance.
Simple carbohydrates such as sugars and starches are readily digested by all animals. The complex carbohydrates (cellulose, hemicelluloses) that make up the fibrous stems of plants are broken down by bacterial and protozoal action in the rumen of cattle and sheep or in the cecum of rabbits and horses. Such complex carbohydrates cannot be digested by humans or, to any appreciable extent, by dogs, cats, birds, or laboratory animals. Thus, ruminants and some herbivorous animals obtain much more of the energy-giving nutrients from the carbohydrates of plants than do monogastric carnivores and omnivores, for which fibrous materials have little or no energy value.
Fat in feeds has a high nutritive value because it is easily digested and because it supplies about two and one-quarter times as much energy as an equal weight of starch or sugar. While fat has a high nutritive value, it can be replaced by an equivalent amount of digestible carbohydrates in the feed, except for small amounts of essential fatty acids. Very small amounts of the unsaturated fatty acid linoleic, contained in some fats, are necessary for growth and health. Animal feeds typically supply ample amounts of this acid unless it has been removed by processing.