Effects of Offering Malt Distillers Grains (Draff) as a Replacement for Concentrates in Silage based Diets for Dairy cows

Extract

The control of milk production costs has gained even greater importance when striving to improve profitability under a quota regime. Consequently there is a resurgence of interest in the use of competitively priced byproduct feedstuffs for dairy cows. However detailed information concerning the use of distillery byproducts under UK conditions is scarce. This experiment examines the effect of replacing a proprietary pelleted concentrate with malt distillers grains (draff).

In a changeover design experiment consisting of 4 three week periods, sixteen autumn calving British Friesian cows were offered four treatments, in which draff plus a mineral supplement replaced part of the concentrate allocation. The mineral supplement was formulated and fed to ensure that levels of calcium, phosphorus, magnesium, sodium and potassium supplied by the concentrate plus draff/mineral fraction of the diet were equal for all treatments. Cows were offered silage ad libitum with both concentrates and draff/mineral being offered separately in two feeds per day.