Finishing cattle off grass quickly has many advantages
Beef finishers were encouraged by recent prices, and as a result, stores have been a good trade in marts countrywide, .
There has been some downward price pressure of late, but hopefully this will not continue.
Whether you rear your own cattle or purchase them for finishing, one thing critical to the success of your business is how well you finish them.
Cattle should never be put on an intensive finishing diet until it is appropriate.
This has nothing to do with their age, and everything to do with how well they have been grown. It is still too regular an occurrence for finishers to be disappointed with carcase and fat scores, because the cattle were fed too early, and slaughtered due to age, or due to a perceived optimum duration of the finishing period.
Knowing how to manage feeding the type of stock you have is important, before you put them on a finishing diet. Their start weight, breed and sex will determine their intake, and dictate what type of ingredients should be included in the finishing diet.
Each type of stock will require slightly different nutrition, for optimum performance.
Obviously, if you are finishing young bulls, they have no business outdoors at this stage. They will burn up too much energy, as they tend to be too active and aggressive. Remember farm safety; drawing meal to young bulls is not a sport for the faint hearted!
Autumn grass management
There are two main objectives for grassland management once you get into August — maintain animal performance from good quality grass, and prepare swards for autumn grazing.
In the middle of August, grass quality begins to deteriorate due to a drop off in dry matter and sugars.
To make best use of autumn grass, it is essential to avoid wet weather poaching.
Dividing bigger fields into grazing blocks for two or three days will give better utilisation, and allow areas ahead to continue to grow.
A back fence to restrict grazing of re-growths will allow covers to recover, for subsequent grazing before closing for the winter.
Continue to apply fertiliser right up to the closing date, as there will be a response while conditions allow. Soil temperatures are currently excellent, so take advantage of it.
Finishing off grass
At best, autumn grass can achieve 0.75 kg of live weight gain per day in finishing cattle, whereas the target is a gain of at least 1 kg per day.
Cattle always show a good response at grass when supplemented with 2.5-3 kg of meal per day, at this time of year — provided that excellent quality grass is available.
If excellent quality grass is not available, it will be necessary to feed up to 6 kg/day to heavy heifers or steers that are close to finish.
The amount of meal needed will depend on the breed and sex of the animals being fed.
At this time of year, finishing cattle off grass quickly has many advantages, in terms of stocking rate, profitability and work load.
Appropriate concentrates
Meal needs to be high in energy and low in protein in order to get the final cover of fat on cattle quickly.
With cereals off the combine well worth the money at present, good value should be sought when buying any high-energy, low-protein meal.
Barley and oats in particular are ideal complements to autumn grass for advanced stock. Avoid fillers like palm kernel and sunflower in mixes, they do not add anything to a finishing ration.
