Beef Grist - Spring 2024

Beef Grist

A PERIODIC NEWSLETTER PRODUCED BY

GRAND VALLEY FORTIFIERS

SPRING 2024

Dear Beef Producing Friends,

It has been some time since we delivered a Grand Valley Beef Grist to your mailbox however in 2024 we will endeavor to provide a spring and fall issue with interesting articles that provide timely information for making decisions on your operation. I trust you all enjoyed the easy winter and benefitted from warmer temperatures when calving this winter and spring. Looking ahead to this coming summer, we hope and pray for good moisture but with little snow cover this winter and an early spring, we should be ready for a dry summer. In this issue of the Spring Beef Grist you’ll find a valuable article by Hannah Simpson, one of our new ruminant nutrition team

Why Forage Test?

The Importance of Testing

Your Forages by:

Hannah Simpson, Ruminant Nutritionist

Forage analysis is often something producers may overlook due to costs; however, the analysis of forages is a valuable tool for developing feeding strategies for beef cattle which are cost and resource efficient. By testing your forages, nutritionists and beef specialists can develop a deeper understanding of the nutritional level of a given forage, allowing for intensified feed management, and ensuring nutritional demands of the herd are being met.

If you’re not testing, then you’re guessing! When on farm forages are not tested, sneaky production problems such as poor average daily gain and decreased conception can be caused by mineral and/or nutrient deficiencies or excesses, mycotoxins, and nitrates. Additionally, having a current forage analysis can ensure there are no nutritional gaps, with all nutritional needs of beef cattle being met during each stage of production. As stages of production progress, the nutritional needs of your cattle will vary whether you are breeding, growing, or finishing the group. Factors such as body condition score, hair coat, and hide thickness will impact

members, highlighting the importance and power of forage testing to maximizing your cattle’s health and performance. A guest author and Masters student at the University of Guelph, Sarah Dean, has shared new research surrounding the effects of supplementing Vitamin A during pregnancy. We hope you enjoy these articles and wish you a safe spring and good growing season on your beef operation.

Sincerely,

Dave Ross VP of Customer Advocacy & Experiential Marketing, GVF group of companies

the nutritional requirements, and even environmental factors such as weather patterns, mud depth, and bunk space can impact requirements. In terms of cost benefits, feeding programs can be optimized as a least cost formulation as well as having the opportunity to accurately price feed when buying or selling forages.

Avoiding Costly Problems

One of the largest benefits of testing your forages is the mitigation of costly problems before they impact your cattle. With forage quality and quantity varying year to year, with some years having exceptional yields and other years having to outsource forages, forage testing becomes essential.

Molds & Toxins

Similar to grains, mold can occur in forages due to certain plant diseases, such as ergot. As weather patterns change, the incidence of plant diseases will increase in times of wet growing conditions. The incidence of molds can dramatically affect the overall palatability of the feed, in addition to the energy content, as well as create reproduction and health problems due to the presence of mycotoxins. Mycotoxins being present in your forage such as vomitoxin, fuminosins, and aflatoxin can lead to poor reproductive performance, depressed gains, and in serious cases death. Although avoiding molds in forages isn’t always possible, testing your forages to determine the potential severity of the problem can help nutritionists find a realistic solution.

Mineral Nutrition

Forage quality has a substantial impact on mineral nutrition, as mineral availability within forages will fluctuate depending on seasonality, quality, plant species, and processing methods. Trace minerals such as zinc, copper, and manganese require supplementation as they are important pieces in terms of reproduction, health, and growth of any beef animal. Additionally, minerals such as molybdenum and sulfur, due to their antagonistic properties can alter a cows’ ability to absorb zinc, copper, and manganese. Certain soils and therefore forages can be high in molybdenum, leading to copper deficiencies which producers may be unaware of. It is highly recommended to supplement with minerals year-round, and work with a nutritionist to understand how a mineral program can be supplemented with the forages available to ensure all animal requirements are being met 365 days a year.

How to Interpret a Forage Analysis

Labs such as Cumberland Valley Analytical Services provide forage analysis services and information such as moisture content, crude protein, total digestible nutrients, vitamins, and minerals. When reviewing a forage test, the analysis can contain values which may be confusing. Below is a brief explanation of some of the most important factors when understanding your farms forages:

• Dry Matter (DM%): Refers to the moisture content of the given forage sample. Moisture and dry matter content as a percent will always equal 100.

• Crude Protein (CP%): Estimate of protein is based on multiplying feed sample nitrogen content by 6.25.Non-protein nitrogen (NPN) includes sources such as urea, which can increase CP.

• Neutral Detergent Fibre (NDF%: Suggests the amount of fibre content within a forage.Mature forages will have increased NDF%.

• Acid Detergent Fibre (ADF%): Includes cellulose and lignin to account for the least digestible parts of the forage. High ADF can indicate that forage digestibility is poor and more mature.

• uNDF (240hr): Predicts forage digestibility, as it is the portion of NDF that is not digested after 240 hours.Best predictor for forage intake potential

• Relative Forage Quality (RFQ): A report card for overall forage quality (higher=better). Estimates intake and TDN%. RFQ will vary on grasses vs legume forages.

Interested in Testing Your Forages?

If forage testing is something you would like to implement on your farm, below are a few steps to begin the process of improving your herds overall nutrition:

01. Determine your forage resources. Does your forage inventory align with amounts being fed?

02. Evaluate what your goals are for forage testing. What is your motivation behind forage testing?

03. Think of potential problems you are trying to avoid. Are mycotoxins or mineral interactions a problem in your herd?

Take Home Message

Investing in forage testing is a low-cost, high-gain tool that can assist in making educated decisions that will have long lasting effects, thus benefiting farm economics and cattle health.

Contact your local Grand Valley Fortifiers representative to begin testing your forages!

Vitamin A enriched diet at late gestation affects intramuscular fat deposition in beef offspring

by: Sarah Dean MSc student at University of Guelph

When describing high quality beef, most people would describe beef that has a high degree of marbling, as marbling greatly enhances the tenderness and juiciness of beef. As such, beef with a high degree of marbling is considered to be more valuable. Producing this high-quality beef while remaining efficient and sustainable is a common goal among all beef producers. They need to be able to provide high quality beef to consumers while minimizing the production of excess waste. To this end, low-cost strategies to increase production are highly sought after. One such strategy which we are exploring through our research is the effectiveness of supplementing vitamin A during late gestation to increase marbling within the offspring. Marbling can be a challenging trait to achieve, as the degree to which marbling is formed is affected by genetic, sexual, nutritional, and management factors. Generally, most efforts to increase marbling are made during the finishing stage, when high concentrate diets during the finishing stage contribute to marbling. However, other fat depots such as subcutaneous and visceral fat will also increase. These fat depots are often considered ‘waste fat’ whereas intramuscular fat, or marbling, is considered ‘taste fat’. Therefore, the goal is to increase intramuscular fat without increasing subcutaneous and visceral fat. Intramuscular fat is developed during the late stage of pregnancy (third trimester) until 250 days of age (roughly weaning age). This time period is known as the marbling window (Figure 1).

During the marbling window undifferentiated progenitor cells are committing to either myogenic lines or adipogenic lines – in other words, either to become muscle cells or fat cells. In order to increase marbling, we are utilizing vitamin A to increase the commitment to adipogenic lines, or fat cells. When vitamin A is ingested, it becomes retinoic acid. At early stages of development, retinoic acid can regulate the expression of specific genes associated with fat cell development by upregulating the commitment of progenitor cells to become preadipocytes, which likely contribute to marbling deposition later in life. It is essential to increase the intramuscular adipose cells during this time, as after the marbling window, there is no increase in the number of intramuscular adipose cells, they will only increase in size.

Past research has shown that vitamin A injected into calves at birth had a positive association with marbling. My research is taking this a step further by exploring the supplementation of vitamin A during the third trimester of pregnancy to determine the effect on marbling in the offspring. Thirty angus cross cows pregnant with male calves were randomly assigned to two experimental treatments from 180 gestation until calving: a control group (CON, n=15) receiving 56.76 KIU of vitamin A per day, and a vitamin A supplemented group (VITA, n=15) receiving 227.12 KIU vitamin A per day. Vitamin A was directly incorporated into a pre-mix that was then added to the feed via a TMR mixer. After calving, all cow-calf pairs were raised as a single herd; there were no differences in raising either group and all calves were raised under the same conditions through to slaughter. Within 10 days of calving, skeletal muscle biopsies were collected from the calves to be later analyzed for gene expression and protein abundance of target genes/proteins relating to adipogenesis. Steers were ultrasounded several times throughout their life to monitor the development of intramuscular fat and subcutaneous fat. Steers were slaughtered at 16 months of age when various carcass measurements were collected and evaluated.

Various genes and proteins were evaluated for their expression and abundance to see the impact of higher levels of vitamin A on pathways to create fat cells. There was increased expression of a receptor for retinoic acid (RARβ); indicating that there was upregulation of retinoic acid receptors due to increased retinoic acid being present from feeding more vitamin A. Also, when looking at the genes associated with adipocyte (fat cell) development it was found that there was an increased expression of genes that are likely to lead to an increased number of fat cells being produced (PPARγ and DlK1). DLK1 is associated with the formation of preadipocytes and PPARγ is associated with the commitment of preadipocytes to become mature adipocytes (Figure 2). These results suggest that the presence of more vitamin A, produces more cells that are committed to making intramuscular fat.

Frequent ultrasound imaging showed increased intramuscular fat deposition in vitamin A supplemented calves throughout all evaluated time periods, while there were no changes observed within subcutaneous fat thickness between groups. Hot carcass weight, dressing percentage, carcass size, and internal fat was not affected by treatment. Carcass grades are yet to be analyzed.

These results suggest that vitamin A supplementation during late gestation enhances intramuscular adipogenesis in offspring, meaning the offspring have the potential to produce more marbling and more of a quality meat product. However, the underlying mechanisms of the direct effects of vitamin A on intramuscular adipocyte population requires further investigation, which we will be conducting in the near future.

Thought of the Day!

“God does not give us everything we want, but He does fulfill His promises, leading us along the best and straightest paths to Himself.”

– Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Figure 1: The “Marbling window.” This diagram shows the period of adipose tissue and muscle development in beef cattle from conception to slaughter. Source: Adapted from Cosa et al (2021).