Nov. 24, 2011 - The current hay shortage has livestock producers grasping at straws. For many, less than ideal conditions have provided the ideal time to experiment with alternate feeds -- including cotton.
In light of the hay shortage, some have followed the example of more northern states, sacrificing some of their cotton crop to feed livestock. It's not a common practice in Texas, so Dr. Tryon Wickersham an AgriLife Research animal nutrition scientist was part of a project to determine the best way to utilize cotton as a feed source.
"The reason we did the project is there where people who were feeding it and some nutritionist wanted to know if we have any information on what these people were feeding," he explained. "We didn't really have any real knowledge about that, so we wanted to figure out what it was, so we could tell them what they might want to supplement with that, or how they might want to go about feeding that."
It isn't uncommon to see crop residues baled up for forage after harvest, but as with most crop residues, there are a few key factors that need to be considered before feeding.
"There are a lot of chemicals used on cotton, either pesticides or defoliants as part of the natural process of harvesting cotton," Corriher explained. "Obviously, those products are labeled for cotton fields, but people need to be aware of those chemicals that are used on the cotton as plants. A lot of them may have restrictions for livestock, maybe a 30- or 45-day restriction before you can feed it to livestock. So, knowing the types of chemicals that are used on that crop is very important."
Through research, Wickersham came to find that while feeding cotton residue can be done given precautions, it is not as nutritionally valuable as feeding the whole cotton plant.
"Compared to regular hays, mostly Bermudagrass, it is actually probably higher than the average Bermudagrass from a crude protein standpoint produced," Wickersham explained. "So, there is more crude protein in the cotton plants, in the residue, than what we would expect to find in most Bermuda grass hay produced in Texas. In terms or total digestible nutrients, it is probably on the higher side as well, it is around 60 percent total digestible nutrients, most of that we are attributing to the presence of the seed, so all of these products still have the cottonseed in it and the cotton in it."
Since it is so much higher in crude protein and total digestible nutrients, Wickersham warned that it should not be fed like regular grass hay. Rather it would be something that a producer probably won't want to give in a free-choice scenario.
Feeding the whole plant can, in some cases, cause scours because it is so much richer than common hay options, however, if choosing to feed cotton stalks for filler, there are some more pressing dangers if not fed properly.
"Basically, if the cotton has been defoliated, it is going to have been sprayed with a product and you can't graze the animals for 30 to 45 days after the application of that product," Wickersham said. "But, one of the products that we looked at was the whole plant which would have included the stems and leaves and everything that hadn't been defoliated, so that would be the ideal plant to feed -- the whole cotton plant."
This is a study that Wickersham and his colleagues plan to continue to find out more about how to feed cotton and its affects on livestock.
"We took the samples and measured the nutrition value so the university hasn't actually fed it to anybody," Wickersham explained. From what we have heard some cattleman are feeding it. We definitely would like to try and feed some and see how it works. We have just had difficulty to find some of the product to feed ourselves. It is one of those things that once we got the answer to people, a lot of people had already started feeding it and had fed a lot of the product up."
So while common in other states, this is fairly new to Texas, but researchers and forage specialists are seeking more answers to see how this can become part of a diet for livestock to help out in future times when the state could be in this type of drought scenario.
"I think as far as my knowledge, this is probably somewhat fairly new at least in Texas," Corriher said. "You hear more of this is the southeastern states such as Georgia, they have quite a bit of cotton produced in those areas, especially south Georgia. Here, I think it is very new because people are getting desperate. There is just not as much hay available and a lot of the hay is coming from other states. People see this as an opportunity, either for the cotton producers to make extra money or to help producers, whether they know the true value of the product or not. They are just looking for anything that may be cheaper than shipping that hay in from another state."
