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Cattle nutrition: Is rotational grazing the answer?: Part One …two forage categories, wet and dry

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RECENTLY I had several queries relating to cattle nutrition; what is nutrition?
For cattle, nutrition is a process in the animals involving an intake of nutrient materials and their subsequent assimilation into the tissues.
Cattle have a very diverse diet that provides them with different nutrients.
The ingredients that go into livestock feed are called feedstuffs. The feedstuffs cattle consume consist of roughages, grains, oilseeds and by-products.
Forage is essentially food for cattle or horses, especially hay or straw.
Contrary to many assumptions, straw is in fact, the stalks of threshed grain, especially of wheat, rye, oats, barley or rapoko and mhunga stalks; which are used as fodder.
Fodder is a generic term for the bulk feed for livestock.
It implies plants that are consumed mainly by grazing livestock, like grass or hay.
Forages/silage fall into two groups, wet and dry.
An example, of wet forage is silage that has been preserved in a moist, succulent condition by partial fermentation in a tight container (silo) above or below ground.
The majority of the food cattle eat comes from this type of feedstuff.
Dry forages are pasture (fresh forage) or high quality grass hay or straw.
Some farmers will feed a mix of both silage and hay, while others might only feed silage or only feed hay, depending on the area.
Cattle also require concentrates which comprise of proteins, fats, minerals and vitamins. Primary sources of carbohydrates are barley, maize, oats, wheat, molasses, bonemeal, and soya been hulls. Cotton meal, cake and hulls are also important ingredients in cattle and sheep feeds.
Additionally cattle also require a variety of micronutrients that are essential to make quality feeds; including amino acids, minerals and vitamins; most of which are not currently manufactured in Zimbabwe and have to be imported.
Many co-products used for cattle feed are leftover ingredients from food production for humans; the manufacture and provision of which was the main industry of Agro Foods, National Foods and Blue Ribbon Foods in Zimbabwe in the past.
The feed industry produced 449 000mt of feed.
In 2014; however, capacity utilisation was very low accounting for only 29 percent leading to high fixed costs per unit of feed produced.
Reviving the production of stockfeed as a viable and critical component of command livestock farming in Zimbabwe is essential.
Crop residues also form an important source of winter feed for livestock which are either grazed in-situ or are harvested and stored.
Maize is the dominant crop in the high- and medium-potential areas and is grown both as a cash and food crop.
In the very dry areas sorghum and millet are grown instead of maize.
Countries with excess or low-value land, such as the Lowveld areas, tend to grass-feed their cattle herds, while those countries with excess feed grains, such as the US and Canada, finish cattle with a grain ration.
Grain-fed cattle have more internal fat (‘marbling’ in the meat) resulting in more tender and juicier meat than forage-fed cattle of a similar age.
The lack of supplementary feeding of proteins, minerals or concentrates by most of Zimbabwe’s rural farmers is due to lack of husbandry knowledge, cash and to the relatively low importance of commercial production from the cattle herd.
A common feature of the Zimbabwe communal area agricultural system is that the system of production is mixed that is crop-livestock, with crops playing a major direct economic role in the high rainfall areas of Natural Regions I-III.
Livestock assumes a more significant economic role in the lower rainfall areas of Natural Regions IV and V.
Grazing in the Zimbabwe communal areas is characterised by communal use of grazing resources. This is because land in the communal areas is still under the communal system of land tenure, thus a communal area farmer is not at liberty to try recommended technologies since grazing land is under communal use thereby limiting technical inputs.
Prior to the Land Reform Programme, it was estimated that about 850 000 landholders lived in an area covering a total of 16,20 million hectares — under 20 hectares per household.
Access to adequate grazing land as a critical animal feed resource is an important characteristic of animal management in the communal areas of Zimbabwe.
It implies animals gain access to highly nutritious feed towards the end of the dry season; however, this is still insufficient.
Because of the high grazing pressure during this time of the year, a large overlap in herbivory occurs, as most animals would not subsist on browsing.
It follows therefore, that animals without supplementary feeding are in poor condition at the onset of the rains in October or November.
Thus heavy losses are incurred at this time of the year due to the animal’s body very low reserves, and unable to generate enough energy to keep the animals warm.
In trying to address the problem of communal overgrazing early in the 1980s, grazing schemes and range reinforcement with forage legumes were promoted by the department of AGRITEX with donor assistance and some non-government organisations (NGOs) who promoted rotational grazing or split season veld management with the incorporation of legumes.
However, due to lack of expertise and agrarian authority and involvement of farmers at planning and implementation stages there have been no positive results from any of the established grazing schemes.
Dr Tony Monda holds a PhD. in Art Theory and Philosophy and a DBA (Doctorate in Business Administration) and Post-Colonial Heritage Studies. He is a writer, lecturer, musician, art critic, practicing artist and Corporate Image Consultant. He is also a specialist Art Consultant, Post-Colonial Scholar, Zimbabwean Socio-Economic analyst and researcher. He can be contacted on e-mail: tonym.MONDA@gmail.com

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