Why We Use Dry Matter in Animal Nutrition
Dry matter is the amount of nutrient-dense residue that remains after water is removed. It can be from grain or fresh forages. A horse eating an eighty-pound-barrel-worth of feed daily will need about twenty pounds of dry matter per day. Using a Koster test, we can estimate how much feed an animal will need in order to meet its daily dry matter needs. Most producers use dry matter demand as a guideline when calculating dry matter requirements for their animals. However, it is important to remember that dry matter demands vary widely among animals. It is therefore important to use these estimates as guidelines only, and to evaluate the diets of individual animals. In addition, dry matter demand can be affected by environmental factors, and therefore, should be considered only as a general guideline. The dry matter content of a feed ingredient is important in determining the nutritional value. If there is a large amount of water, the dry matter content may be less than the nutrients found in the feed. In addition, the water content of a feed ingredient may