Close Up Ration Energy | The CWT Group

I uploaded two PDFs from Balchem’s website that discuss milk production between controlled energy diets (80-100% ME) and high energy diets (140-150% ME) and choline. It seems pretty clear that while controlled energy close up diets improve fresh cow metabolic problems, they also decrease early lactation milk production. I suspect that there is also a negative effect on colostrum.

Since these are Balchem advertisements, of course the solution to just increase energy and feed Reashure to all animals. But I’m wondering what close up energy you think leads to the best performance.

Generally my close up rations are between 110 and 120% of ME but for sure I don’t have accurate body weights on these animals (in between the treatments for the referenced studies). I’m not using choline anywhere.

Do you feel that as these lower energy close up diets have become more common, we have seen in decrease in early lactation production or colostrum? What are your thoughts on increasing energy and using choline?

Looking forward to hearing your opinions.

2 Comments

Robert Fry on October 1, 2018 at 2:54 pm

I typically strive to keep CUD diets ME at 100-110 % of requirement and do not sense it has a negative impact on startup milk, although I have nothing to compare as a control. As you mention the the % of req is heavily predicated on DMI, often unknown, and certainly varys widely from cow to cow. Becasue of these unknowns I’ve found a comfortable place to be is a ME density of ~1.00 – 1.02 Mcal ME/lb DM for CUD cows.

One more thing while were on the topic of controlled energy. Several years ago I listened to a presentation by Mike Overton (Elanco) about the importance of controlled energy intake in FOD cows actually being more influencial on transition health and start up milk. His comments referenced a JDS paper that I will add to the Consultant Files. It’s worth reading when you have time. Subsequent to studying that paper I have for several years actively tried to limit FOD ME to 100-105% (be sure you have the DCC in the cow description correct to predict the req.) This has had more impact to transition health than anything else I’ve ever done to dry cow diets.

Jim Aldrich on October 2, 2018 at 12:41 pm

Thanks to Dr Maulfair for initiating this topic. Good point by Dr. Fry reminding us of the work out of Drackley’s group at Illinois indicating that the energy in the far off ration matters. The Dane et al. paper he cited, in fact, suggests that the FO diet had more effect on post-partum performance than the close-up diet. Drackley has commented that if you feed too much energy for too long i.e. the entire dry period, these cows become like Type II Diabetics and become very insulin resistant (which fresh cows are anyway). He also had some data and pictures that showed cows that were overfed energy in the dry period developed more internal fat even though body condition score wasn’t different from cows fed lower energy. If I recall correctly this adipose tissue is the first mobilized (versus subcutaneous stores) during early lactation negative energy balance and goes more directly to the liver – so even more risk for fatty liver.
Over the last 10 plus years, once we got over the steam up idea, and have generally gone to lower energy diets in the dry period, I really can’t say I’ve seen consistent effects one way or another on early lactation milk. Maybe start up (that early 30-day period in Dairy Comp, which most people ignore anyway because there is a lot of variation) or first test is a tad lower, but I haven’t seen a consistent relationship with peak milk relative to CU energy levels. Likely there are so many other factors at play that affect peaks. I do see more complaints about lower colostrum yields than I did a long time ago. Whether that is related to lower energy or more negative DCAD or lower metabolizable protein (MP), I’m not certain. The usual suspect in low colostrum yield (other than water intake and calcium) might be MP. I have this idea that we might overestimate MP from microbial protein on these lower energy higher straw type diets. Realizing the model should account for this given microbial yield is relative to the amount of fermentable carbs and these are lower in these diets. But because intake and rumen turnover are lower in dry cows diets than lactating cow diets (and microbial yield predictions are derived mostly from lactating cow trials) there may be more predation and microbial cell turnover leading to lower microbial protein flow to the small intestine. The models don’t adjust for this. Maybe this is why we need to shoot for 1200-1400 g of MP in CU diets (at least that’s a Tom Overton recommendation), when we really only need 1,100 or so for factorial requirements. As a side comment – looking at total MP g is highly dependent on DMI. Stating the obvious it’s sure easier to provide 1,300 g in 30 lb vs 24 lb of intake. Should we look at MP in terms of g/lb (45 g/lb @ 28 lb DMI = 1,260 g).
As far as choline is concerned I do think there is a place for it in both CU and fresh cow diets. I just wish it was a little less costly. I also like to consider monensin, chromium, and methionine in CU diets. I’d be interested in other’s opinions on these. I’ve already taken up my allotted consultant reply space on this topic.

Robert Fry on October 1, 2018 at 2:54 pm

I typically strive to keep CUD diets ME at 100-110 % of requirement and do not sense it has a negative impact on startup milk, although I have nothing to compare as a control. As you mention the the % of req is heavily predicated on DMI, often unknown, and certainly varys widely from cow to cow. Becasue of these unknowns I’ve found a comfortable place to be is a ME density of ~1.00 – 1.02 Mcal ME/lb DM for CUD cows.

One more thing while were on the topic of controlled energy. Several years ago I listened to a presentation by Mike Overton (Elanco) about the importance of controlled energy intake in FOD cows actually being more influencial on transition health and start up milk. His comments referenced a JDS paper that I will add to the Consultant Files. It’s worth reading when you have time. Subsequent to studying that paper I have for several years actively tried to limit FOD ME to 100-105% (be sure you have the DCC in the cow description correct to predict the req.) This has had more impact to transition health than anything else I’ve ever done to dry cow diets.
Jim Aldrich on October 2, 2018 at 12:41 pm

Thanks to Dr Maulfair for initiating this topic. Good point by Dr. Fry reminding us of the work out of Drackley’s group at Illinois indicating that the energy in the far off ration matters. The Dane et al. paper he cited, in fact, suggests that the FO diet had more effect on post-partum performance than the close-up diet. Drackley has commented that if you feed too much energy for too long i.e. the entire dry period, these cows become like Type II Diabetics and become very insulin resistant (which fresh cows are anyway). He also had some data and pictures that showed cows that were overfed energy in the dry period developed more internal fat even though body condition score wasn’t different from cows fed lower energy. If I recall correctly this adipose tissue is the first mobilized (versus subcutaneous stores) during early lactation negative energy balance and goes more directly to the liver – so even more risk for fatty liver.
Over the last 10 plus years, once we got over the steam up idea, and have generally gone to lower energy diets in the dry period, I really can’t say I’ve seen consistent effects one way or another on early lactation milk. Maybe start up (that early 30-day period in Dairy Comp, which most people ignore anyway because there is a lot of variation) or first test is a tad lower, but I haven’t seen a consistent relationship with peak milk relative to CU energy levels. Likely there are so many other factors at play that affect peaks. I do see more complaints about lower colostrum yields than I did a long time ago. Whether that is related to lower energy or more negative DCAD or lower metabolizable protein (MP), I’m not certain. The usual suspect in low colostrum yield (other than water intake and calcium) might be MP. I have this idea that we might overestimate MP from microbial protein on these lower energy higher straw type diets. Realizing the model should account for this given microbial yield is relative to the amount of fermentable carbs and these are lower in these diets. But because intake and rumen turnover are lower in dry cows diets than lactating cow diets (and microbial yield predictions are derived mostly from lactating cow trials) there may be more predation and microbial cell turnover leading to lower microbial protein flow to the small intestine. The models don’t adjust for this. Maybe this is why we need to shoot for 1200-1400 g of MP in CU diets (at least that’s a Tom Overton recommendation), when we really only need 1,100 or so for factorial requirements. As a side comment – looking at total MP g is highly dependent on DMI. Stating the obvious it’s sure easier to provide 1,300 g in 30 lb vs 24 lb of intake. Should we look at MP in terms of g/lb (45 g/lb @ 28 lb DMI = 1,260 g).
As far as choline is concerned I do think there is a place for it in both CU and fresh cow diets. I just wish it was a little less costly. I also like to consider monensin, chromium, and methionine in CU diets. I’d be interested in other’s opinions on these. I’ve already taken up my allotted consultant reply space on this topic.