Cost-effective lamb feeding key to profitable growth
The sooner lambs can be encouraged to eat dry feed, the quicker the rumen develops and the faster lambs grow. Relying on the natural development of the lamb’s rumen on grazed grass alone is all well and good, but it’s not a system designed to maximise lamb performance.
Without access to a suitable hard feed, rumen development will be much slower, and there is a real risk of a check in lamb growth following weaning. For the majority of lamb producers, the financial benefits from finishing better quality lambs faster will easily outweigh any extra feed costs.
Even during the first month following lambing, offering lambs a highly palatable concentrate feed will quickly make them less dependent on the ewe and grow more strongly throughout their life. But the right type of high quality creep feed is crucial if lamb performance is to be maximised.
One ADAS Rosemaund trial, for example, showed that when sugar beet feed replaced a proportion of the cereal in an ad lib creep ration, growth rate increased by 8-12% (table 1), allowing lambs to be sold two weeks earlier. The improvement is a direct result of the better rumen development that takes place when using digestible fibre-based feeds, and the benefits of sugar beet feed in promoting good rumen function and encouraging intakes.
Table 1 – ADAS Rosemaund lamb creep feeding trial results
|
Cereal-based creep |
Sugar beet feed-based creep |
Improvement |
|
|
Lamb birth weight (kg) |
4.8 |
4.8 |
|
|
Growth rate (g/day): |
|||
|
Singles |
283 |
317 |
+12% |
|
Twins |
257 |
276 |
+7% |
|
Triplets |
250 |
269 |
+8% |
Creep feed protein content is also important when looking to support high growth rates, with both high-cereal rations and those based on sugar beet feed needing a protein boost to reach the recommended 16-18% target. Take care to ensure the protein source is suitable for feeding to young lambs.
Finally, those wanting to finish lambs quickly to catch any premium available from the traditional ‘Easter’ market should aim for a minimum of 18% protein, including a high rumen-bypass protein supplement like SoyPass to support fast growth. SoyPass a much more cost-effective source of this high quality protein than soyabean meal, and will help maximise both growth rates and the value of the ration.
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