Supply of trace minerals elements forms an integral part of dairy cattle nutrition program. They are similarly as essential to your dairy herd as feeding them on feed well balanced with nutrient classes of energy, proteins and vitamins.
Feed, be it formulated or pasture sources rich in these nutrient classes, cannot meet trace minerals elements that fully benefit dairy cows.
Therefore as part of feeding your dairy herd, it is of worth considering supplementing them with trace minerals elements to fully maximize the benefits of providing quality feed.
This means that it is not profitable or desirable to leave the mineral demand of your dairy cows to chance.
From the first paragraph, it appears that you formulate feed for your dairy cows, this must be the good quality feed you are referring to in the second part; but what is your definition of a good quality feed?
A good quality dairy feed should contain grains, good quality forage, proteins source, minerals and vitamins in the right quantities and proportions.
This mixture when fed to an animal, is called a total mixed ration (TMR). The minerals in this feed provide the trace elements.
Trace elements are required in very minute quantities in the animal body; the requirement is dependent on the age, sex and stage of production of the animal.
However, the demand for trace elements increases during stressful situations like calving, high performance or disease.
OPTIMAL GROWTH
The main trace elements essential for cattle include copper, zinc, manganese, cobalt, iodine, iron and selenium.
These elements are important in the functioning of hormones and enzymes and thus play a key role in metabolism, health and immunity.
They contribute to optimal growth, production and reproduction. Their deficiency will therefore lead to poor fertility, poor growth, disturbance in pigmentation, porous bones and poor feed conversion efficiency among other problems.
When formulating feed, it is important to know that forages do not contain enough trace elements to cover the needs of high yielding dairy cows and that the amount of trace elements on pastures depends mainly on the soils, where the plant is sourced from, plant population and type of fertiliser used.
For example grasses sourced from parts of Nakuru have low levels of cobalt, which is itself a trace element. It is because of these reasons that it is important to supplement these trace and other minerals in the animal’s diet.
KEEP ANIMALS HEALTHY
Trace mineral elements have proven to consistently deliver higher profitability to dairy herds. Dietary supplements are available in commercial packs in crystal forms which may be added to feeds, powder licks and water-soluble administered through drinking water or oral drench.
When given as part of overall dairy nutrition program, they put up the foundation for long-term healthy herd.
They are beneficial in that they get into the body systems of the animals thus help keep them healthy, maintain optimum milk production, efficiently improve their reproductive performance and some get stored in the animal’s body mineral stores. So said, they should be available to animals regularly during lactation, dry cow period and to replacement heifers.
To optimally supplement a dairy cow in preparation for lactation, trace mineral supplementation during the dry period and around calving critically improves their health and consequently improve their reproductive performance specifically fertility. Through this, they return to heat early and reduce number of services per conception while heifers exhibit fewer number of days to first service.
There is also reduced occurrences of retained afterbirths/placenta. In mammary health, it helps boost gland resistance and reduce somatic cell count thus improving milk quality.
