Are the animals healthy? How much feed and water are being consumed? Are the animals growing as expected or should I change my delivery schedules? Automatic systems save time and provide you with valuable information about the growth and health of your animals.
Product Manager
Fancom BV
Feed costs account for a major part of the total production costs in livestock farming. On poultry farms, this amounts to approximately 60-65% of the total production costs, while for pig finishers this figure can be as high as 70%. With the currently spiraling feed prices, your farm’s profit margins are under considerable pressure. As a livestock farmer, you cannot exert much influence on feed prices because they are determined by the market. Unless you have your own feed kitchen and lots of your own raw materials, but only a small proportion of livestock farmers have that. What you can do is take a critical look at feed consumption and feed composition on your farm. It is crucial to use feed efficiently and focus on achieving the highest growth per kilo of feed.
INSIGHT INTO FEED COSTS
There are gains to be made by cutting feed costs on almost all pig and poultry farms. Without compromising on the technical results. Quite the opposite in fact, as a balanced feed strategy ensures optimal production from your animals. There are certain points to consider when using a smart strategy to cut feed costs on your farm.
Insight into the feed costs is the first step in making improvements, so it is sensible to start registering feed and water consumption. Producers still often think that the best way to get a grip on the feeding process is to feed manually. But this is a misconception. An automated feeding process includes extensive registration options to keep track of stocks and monitor daily consumption. Even a simple feeding system has feed clocks that register the running times of the system. Clear feed data registration enables you to calculate precise index numbers, compare data and make informed decisions. This also saves time and helps to accurately control how much feed is given, as well as ensuring that each animal is automatically fed its feed ration. And you can notice any abnormal patterns at once. This helps you control feed costs, while abnormalities are a good indicator of any infections or diseases.
FEED ACCORDING TO NEED IN THE CORRECT FEED COMPOSITION
Production animals need extra feed in addition to the ration needed for maintenance. The energy requirement for maintenance is the amount of energy needed by an animal to maintain its vital body functions. The animals also need extra feed for growth and production (e.g. milk, eggs or progeny). As an animal gets older its body weight and feed intake change, as do its nutritional needs. It is therefore important to carefully examine the precise nutritional needs of the animals and feed them a ration that is accurately formulated to achieve optimal technical results. And as soon as possible, switch to larger portions of cheaper feed with a lower mineral content. With broilers, for example, this is done by adding wheat to the ration.
If the feed composition is not adapted during this phase, mineral rich (nitrogen and phosphate), and therefore more expensive, feed will be fed unnecessarily for too long. This leads to a higher feed conversion rate and the associated higher feed costs, but not to better technical results. The surplus minerals will also be released to the environment, leading to unnecessarily high nitrogen and phosphorous emissions.
STOP FEED WASTE
Unnecessary leakage from your feeding system, or overfull feeders are just two examples of easily preventable feed waste. Regularly inspect your feeding system for mechanical defects. System malfunctions are not only a source of annoyance, they can also disrupt animal growth and even affect feed quality. Closely monitor the stocks of feed, clean the feed lines regularly, periodically inspect the mechanical parts in your installation and check the accuracy of feed weighing. Then you can rely on a frictionless feeding process.
Repair any holes or tears in the pipes where feed can leak as quickly as possible. Not just to prevent waste, but also because this leaked feed attracts pests like rodents. Did you know that a rat that weighs 250 grams can easily eat its own weight in feed a day? Keeping the installation clean improves hygiene and prevents feed obstructing the pipes.
Remember to inspect the silo too. Moisture that enters the silo through holes and gaps, for example, will cause caking and promotes mould growth and spoilage of the feed.
Take a walk through the house when the feed lines are operating and look at the eating behaviour of your animals. An easily accessible feeder or pan prevents feed being spilled onto the floor. See whether all the feed is being eaten, or are just the larger pellets picked out, for example. It is often the smaller feed pellets that contain the important nutrients. Another aspect to check is whether any demixing occurs so you can be sure of uniform and homogenous feed quality from the start of the feed line up to the furthest feeders in the house. Adapt the amount of feed if necessary.
CREATE A GOOD HOUSE CLIMATE
Achieving optimal animal performance with minimal feed consumption is the challenge faced by every farmer on a daily basis. Progress in genetics and improved feed management strategies have impacted positively on feed conversion in recent years. Feed conversion is the efficiency with which an animal converts feed into production or weight. The influence of the house climate on the feed conversion rate is also significant.
An important task of the climate control system is to maintain a constant house temperature in the animals’ thermo neutral zone and to prevent cold airdrop onto the animals. The thermal neutral zone is the temperature range within which pigs or poultry can maintain their body temperature without regulating their heat production. When the house temperature is too high, the animals will need to release heat and produce less heat. Eating less can reduce heat production, but their growth will also suffer.
When the house temperature is too low, energy is required to maintain the body temperature. The energy from the feed will be diverted from growth to maintaining the body temperature instead. Researchers at Wageningen University have demonstrated that the average energy demand increases by 1.8% when the temperature drops by 1°C. This means that when the ambient temperature drops by 10°C, the maintenance requirement increases by an average of 18%.
A correctly controlled climate with optimally synchronized interaction between the air inlets and outlets, exhaust system, heating and cooling ensures the best thermal comfort for the animals, whatever the outdoor conditions. Temperature fluctuations – or even worse – draughts must be avoided at all times in the house. Extra sensors measure the relative humidity, CO² of ammonia concentration and monitor the air quality to prevent respiratory infections.
A poor house climate also increases the risk of disease. Animals that are ill often lag behind in growth and need extra feed to recover and catch up on the lost weight. This negatively impacts on feed conversion and the feed costs.
in making improvements
MONITOR THE GROWTH OF YOUR ANIMALS
Continuously weighing your animals provides an up-to-date overview of the growth process in your house. Abnormal growth patterns are visible more quickly, so you can take timely measures to improve your results. Lack of growth that goes unnoticed in the first days of the fattening cycle is almost impossible to recover afterwards. And too rapid growth has a negative impact on animal development. If your animals are too heavy, they are probably being given too much feed. This leads to unnecessarily high feed costs. Weighing often provides insight into the vitality of the animals. If certain animals avoid the weigher, you could ask whether the animals are fit enough to move. Enhanced animal performance and lower feed costs will quickly recover the investment costs of a weighing system.
CONCLUSION: AN AUTOMATIC SYSTEM SAVES TIME AND IMPROVES YOUR RESULTS
Efficient automation of all the processes in the house provides the answers to questions such as: Are the animals healthy? How much feed and water are being consumed? Are the animals growing as expected or should I change my delivery schedules? Automatic systems save time and provide you with valuable information about the growth and health of your animals. Management information that is vital to steer towards a good, efficient performance.
About Patrick Gloudemans
Patrick Gloudemans is Product Manager Feeding System at Fancom BV. He has a strong expertise in smart farming solutions that help farmers to create superior conditions in the house for healthy and future-proof farming. Before joining Fancom six years ago, he spent 19 years working in feed and poultry equipment manufacturing organizations.
