vegetable waste for feed - has anyone any experience

domsmith · Post by **domsmith** » Mon Oct 13, 2008 7:57 pm

We are looking for alternatives to help stretch out the silage. we have seen an advert for ensiled waste vegetables, ideal for beef or dairy(so it says)

does anyone know if they are suitable. would the waste veg work instead of silage for my bulls if i feed it with cake. is veg a reolacement for long fibre?

ideally i would like to mix it with my silage for the cows. and with cake for the young bulls.

any ideas

dom

Penny · Post by **Penny** » Tue Oct 14, 2008 9:36 am

Sorry Dom, I have no experience of this, but am interested that it is allowed. Veg waste is not allowed for pigs, (although many smallholders do!) as anything imported from abroad could theoretically have the Foot and Mouth virus on any mud still on the vegetable.

domsmith · Post by **domsmith** » Tue Oct 14, 2008 11:56 am

hi Penny, veg waste as far as i know is allowed for pigs, but it depends what it is waste from. we feed alot of veg to our pigs which is waste from glosgow fruit market. i have been recently inspected by animal health specificaly fro our pigs and they gave us the all the all clear.
if you are getting waste from a factory that also processes meat etc then its a different story, but cake and bread waste is allowed from the right source.
look into it you could save.

dom

Penny · Post by **Penny** » Tue Oct 14, 2008 2:14 pm

I'm just repeating information on my Defra leaflet about keeping pigs! It said all household vegatable peelings etc are not allowed, regardless of whether they had been near any meat contamination or not. Perhaps this ruling has now been over-ruled?

Duncan MacIntyre · Post by **Duncan MacIntyre** » Tue Oct 14, 2008 3:32 pm

I am not sure but I presume that the waste is from large scale vegetable preparation factories in UK. Such stuff fresh might be too seasonal to be reliable, but I suppose if it has been silaged then it will keep for a considerable time if stored properly and could provide useful input.

I would check SEERAD approval first, and ask the producers for analysis so that you know what you are feeding, and that you can make up any shortcomings. If you go onto a lot of potatoes instead of grain for example as the main energy source you may be short of phosporus in the overall diet which in theory could lead to fertility problems. I suppose there could be constitency problems too if large amounts of one type are being processed and put in the clamp at one time without mixing.

Duncan

Sylvia · Post by **Sylvia** » Tue Oct 14, 2008 4:01 pm

I expect I'll be accused of being negative again but to state the obvious - hay, haylage and silage are all made from grass. Dexters finish on grass and the aforementioned grass products. Even though hay is at a premium again this year there is plenty of haylage and silage about, I really can't see the point in experimenting with peculiar feedstuffs. Particularly in the light of events in the not too distant past in the cattle world. I know that it is only by experimentation that progress is made but I'm surprised anyone would risk using their Dexters as guineapigs.

Issy · Post by **Issy** » Tue Oct 14, 2008 4:09 pm

As far as I am aware you are alowed to feed veg to pigs that has never been in a kitchen (domestic or commercial) or a retail outlet that sells/handles meat and you obviously can feed straight off your own veg patch. As we have no pigs at the moment the dexters are enjoying the runner bean and french bean plants with woody beans crunched like sticks of rock along with spinach and turnips. Our steer even cought a tomatoe thrown in his direction by hubby at the weekend :D (all home grown of course).

clacko · Post by **clacko** » Tue Oct 14, 2008 4:45 pm

alot of poeple feed carrots parsnips and spuds to cattle in east anglia, some years it is dirt cheap, last winter it was not, good at right price carrots they love and are handy to bulk up rations but not much goodness in them, mostly water. spuds seem best once your stock gets a taste for them. we feed parsnips and carrots to wild red deer as they are cheap spuds normally harder to get. paul

Saffy · Post by **Saffy** » Tue Oct 14, 2008 4:52 pm

We used to grow about 800 tons of potatoes a year and kept a dairy herd. The dairy herd had the waste potatoes, the ones with cuts in etc.

Also in a glut year I can remember The Potato Board would buy them off the producer to be used as stock feed, first they had to be sorted to the usual standard, then we had to colour them with dye so they couldn't be sold for human consumption.

The milking cows adored the spuds and could hear the rustling of a bag a long way off, you had to be very careful not to get mugged!

One cow in particular was so fond of them, her head would come up out of the crowd of about a hundred others and home in on the spud bags as they entered the yard. Several of us did it at once or only a few cows would have wolfed the lot.

I decided since she loved them SO MUCH, I would give her the occasion treat and would pop a large potato in my pocket when I was in the spud shed for her. On seeing her prize she would obediently open her mouth extra wide and then shut her eyes with obvious bliss when it crunched!

We upped their potato ration very gradually as they could have an interesting effect on their digestion but they milk well on spuds.

The only danger was the small potato, as they can be swallowed whole and then lodge on the way down but as ours were always sorted no small ones went in anyway.

Stephanie

Edited By Saffy on 1223999594

Saffy · Post by **Saffy** » Tue Oct 14, 2008 5:03 pm

Duncan I wonder how much potato you would need to feed to provoke a fertility problem, is there a ratio? It must be quite a huge amount. As although I cannot remember the poundage per cow we fed, I know it was a fair whack - the max we could give them I would have thought, as we had so many darned spuds and we had a high yielding herd - for those days - the late 80s and our conception rate with AI was excellent, so it was definitely unaffected.

Stephanie

bjreroberts · Post by **bjreroberts** » Tue Oct 14, 2008 8:34 pm

I think the DEFRA direction is quite clear for all farmed animals whether it be cattle, pigs, poultry; if there is any chance of cross contamination with meat then it is not allowed:

- Vegetable waste straight from the field / garden is OK
- Vegetable waste that has gone from source to somewhere where it could (no matter how remotely) be contaminated with meat products is not allowed i.e. if it goes into your kitchen, a supermarket, or if the factory producing the waste also uses meat products.

So if you peel your potatoes in the garden it is fine, but you cannot peel them in the kitchen and then use the peel as feed.

I believe the regulations for pigs are now even tighter, but have to admit I am not up to speed on them.

Louise Badcock · Post by **Louise Badcock** » Tue Oct 14, 2008 9:07 pm

A local beef producer rears calves from bucket to slaughter.
He gets enormous containers of fruit waste. This is added to feed and chopped silage and tested for levels of protein. The only bits left in the trough appeared to be mango seeds. I think the waste came from a factory that prepares fruit for those little cartons you see in M and S etc.
The beef animals were monsters when they were ready to go at 16months.
Louise

domsmith · Post by **domsmith** » Tue Oct 14, 2008 9:53 pm

I am absolutely sure i can feed this kind of vegetable waste, but i am not sure of its value as a cattle feed.

i have spoken to a nutritionist today and it does look quite promising.

Sylvia, the reason for me experimenting with my cattle is because i am in business. the cost of silage is at least £40 per ton without delivery. this waste is £35 delivered. i believe the starch in the rrot veg will fatten cattle very effectively but i am not sure if cattle need some kind of long fibre or not

thanks everyone for their input any more will be appreciated
dom

saffy i too have a dairy cow with a love of potatoes or anything really. bananas grapes everything is eagerly devoured. we grew 30 bags of spuds 2 years ago for ourselves and some for the pigs. i decided to store them at the end of my barn under a sheet but in bags. it was only when i went to get another bag for the house that i discovered my friesien could reach the bags. she had eaten the lot over about 2 weeks. she could not see the problem!!

Sylvia · Post by **Sylvia** » Tue Oct 14, 2008 11:15 pm

Where abouts do you live, domsmith, I don't think silage is anywhere near that price round here. (Carmarthenshire)

Rutherford · Post by **Rutherford** » Wed Oct 15, 2008 12:46 pm

I would hesitate to advise on the mixed waste, but I too, have experience of excellent results with potatos.
During and just after the war I used the 'blued' potatoes that were an excellent milk maker, and a cheap feed at a time of shortages.
Sylvia, the other occasion was unplanned, when some of my cattle broke into an arable field and to my horror 'dug up' several rows of spuds planted for the house, by the time I got there they had virtually swiped the lot, they hadnt been taught that they should stick to grass products!
Beryl (Woodmagic)