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Put our heads together!!

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ddwhitetails

Joined Apr 2009
3,353 Posts | 0+
Fombell PA
We tried a thread before regarding this and it kind of fizzled out.......with the drought hitting the better portion of our corn belt this year we all know we are in for some crazy feed bills........actually I'm sure your already feeling the pain.........can we brain storm together here and try and come up with ideas to supplement the feed with other things other than corn and soy beans....I know you need to have both in the feed but it would be nice if you could cut back on the amounts and supplement it with something else....any ideas?:confused:
 
This may be a dumb answer because I have not researched it much but cotton seed mill is used in a lot of feeds down south for cattle.
 
ddwhitetails said:
Wow....one response.......wow....I guess it's every man for himself..........
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Dennis,

Part of the problem is that there are no really good answers. Energy commodities are based on corn and protein commodities are based on beans. Everything will fluctuate right along with the big 2, for the most part. I used to be in the feed business, and trying to beat the system becomes like a dog chasing its tail. Depending on your recipe, you can look at adding a little urea in for rumen soluble protein, but it is not without risk. I wager most people will suck it up and keep their feed largely the same as it currently is.
 
I heard it may be possible to add barley(barley is fairly cheap), and decrease your corn a bit, I dont know much about it and haven't looked into it too much, but its something I heard one farmer is doing.
 
Other than building more fence for more pens to pasture or rotate, it's expensive either way. I love how healthly my deer are and look but spending $1200-$1500 a month in feed always hurts the bottom line, but I have a responsibility to maintain my animals the best I can, or look seriously into some herd reduction.
 
I would imagine there is going to be some serious herd reduction from alot of guys this year....people are going to be getting rid of deer just so they dont have to feed them, and many will sell for rock bottom prices...I like to stay positive, but its hard to at times when i know my feed bill is going to double or triple, and to raise my 2 year old bucks to three year old shooters for next fall i am going to spend that 2-3X money in feed and next fall I doubt I am going to get 2-3X more for them than i would normally, I will just get my normal share, why not just sell them all this year??? They would have to all gain 100" next summer to cover the cost increase and make me money. Thats what we all have to question, this is going to be the worst year on record for raising any livestock, its going to be rough, but we just have to pray for next years crops and hopefully 13 months from now it gets better..
 
I here you guys ....and NO Dear John I don't want to know where your Mushroom spot is ....I have plenty of my own........Dear John.....just for the redord I wasn't asking people for their entire recipes simply how we could supplement the corn and soybean that we ALL use in our feed.....so your mushroom analogy was WAY OFF! everyone thanks for the responses I talked with a nutritionist today and he basically said what a lot of you mentioned above.......we need to suck it up and try to stay afloat or sell them off and recuced the numbers........not much else you can do .....But Praying is definitely GOOD ADVICE!! Thanks everyone.......just a little frustrated as I am sure we all are.....
 
yes we could pray for rain and see where that would get us or we could do a raindance and the rain will bring the crops up out of the ground.i want to know where dearjohns mushroom spot is.

i buy all my feed in bags and to save i putting up grain bin to buy in bulk and ease the cost a bit.
 
I don't think I would want to know where his shroom spot is they are probably all poisonous....LOL.......good idea with buying in bulk.....ever little bit helps....
 
My feed has went from 525.00 to 725.00 is about 10 week's time. To save money next year I plan to grow my own corn, oat's and soy's. Will have to find someone near me that can roast the bean's. I plan to save the alfalfa stem's that my deer dont eat this winter and grind them to mix back in the feed. Going to buy some of the item's that go in the mix like black strap, kelp and the pellet in bulk to save some as well.



But even keeping my own grain back will be a year before I can do that, we had no corn at all this year, only oat's I have are in food plot's and the only soy's I have on the place are treated seed.
 
ddwhitetails said:
I here you guys ....and NO Dear John I don't want to know where your Mushroom spot is ....I have plenty of my own........Dear John.....just for the redord I wasn't asking people for their entire recipes simply how we could supplement the corn and soybean that we ALL use in our feed.....so your mushroom analogy was WAY OFF! everyone thanks for the responses I talked with a nutritionist today and he basically said what a lot of you mentioned above.......we need to suck it up and try to stay afloat or sell them off and recuced the numbers........not much else you can do .....But Praying is definitely GOOD ADVICE!! Thanks everyone.......just a little frustrated as I am sure we all are.....
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I DONT SEE BEANS MUCH OF A CHANGE , corns tricky needs water , beans not as finnky as corn, put more soy beans in your feed
 
crocket said:
I DONT SEE BEANS MUCH OF A CHANGE , corns tricky needs water , beans not as finnky as corn, put more soy beans in your feed
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Soybean's are one of the high dollar item's in feed. Soy's are over 18 buck's right now raw out of the field. Corn is much cheaper I think 7 something today.
 
Feed prices will fall like a rock when we stop burning corn to make ethanol. Call you elected officials. Or better yet, VOTE Republican!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
Gee I've been raising both corn and beans for years and in my opinion corn can take dry much better then beans hands down ! My beans will be lucky to make 30-35 bu per acre down 15+ bu per acre yet my corn looks as good as ever, should make 150- 180 bu per acre . Lots of guys aren't as lucky as they have little to nothing with the dry summer. Corn won't be dropping like a rock none to soon ethanol or not. Our slightly broke country will always promise corn exports to soften our huge commitment for cash over sea's so I don't think we'll ever see cheap corn again. Gosh I never ever thought I'd hear someone say $7.00 corn was cheaper , but I'm old and the NEW type of farming boggles my mind anyway ..lol :) Why don't we as deer farmers concentrate on why our prices are less than half of what they were 4 years ago . why when everything else in our lives costs us more are we selling bucks sooooo cheap ? In 2009 a 200 class buck was fetching 8 to $11,000 yet today he only brings around $4,000 ! We are not keeping up with the times here , we're going backwards. We are producing bucks much much bigger than just a few years ago but we're selling them for less and less....why ? I got an idea ! Just my opinion .
 
That's because 4 years ago there were a lot less deer farmers than we have today and the market is flooded......therefore it's a buyers market and the preserve owners know it.....you can't blame them for taking advantage of a good thing though......if the prices of feed continue to sky rocket as they are deer farmers will fold right and left and eventually...it will take a while but the demand will go back up.....just my opinion....
 
I didn't vote for him 4 years ago. That is why you can't sell your deer!

Who can afford it?

you lost sight of the real problem
 
don't worry Dear John.....I didn't vote for him either and I am perfectly aware of what a poor job he has done as President......that is all part of the problem I will agree.....however there are issues within our own Industry as well and that is what I was pointing out.......don't worry I will do my part very soon by Voting....to hopefully take care of the problem your talking about.....
 
Dennis, your right there are to many deer being raised but there's also allot of bull ? in the deer industry too . I really don't think any president is going to help us out much there. Gosh you see bucks with one score one day and two days later they've grown 50 inches for a sale of somesort . Now that would be ok during the antler growing season , but how does that happen after they've already dropped them . I know we need to watch what we say in here so I'll stop right there . I'm not sure which super rich lying guy will make the best president but 6 trillion in 4 years just can't happen again ! They all seem to tell us what we want to hear until they are elected , then it's the same ol same ol ! Just an opinion OH ya might want to feed more oats , they're about $3.50 a bu and not bad feed !
 

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