Diet Plan For Cows
If you feed your cows with proper diet then the result would be healthy calves and abundant milk. Cows are basically of two sort one which which are raised to produce calves while the other dairy cows are used to produce milk. The way they need to be fed are different.
Good Diet
Just like us humans, cows also need their minerals, vitamins, proteins and energy intake. Due to this a proper diet of a cow should contain hay, pasture, silage, corn, oats, barley and soybeans. A beef cow usually raises one calf per year and after a period of nine months, the cow nurses her calf till about six months which then produces about a gallon of milk per day. If you wish to keep your cows healthy then you have to feed them about 2% of their body weight. For instance if you cow weighs around 1000 pounds then you would have to feed them about 20 pounds of air dry roughage each day.
A diet of a cow should have grazing pastures or fields of crop residue. If the quality of roughage available is low then the cow would require protein supplements and this has often been seen that proficient blocks and liquids are fed to the cows to increase their protein consumption. Furthermore, they could also be fed with trace minerals salt block which would cater to their need for vitamins and if for a long period, green feed is not available then vitamin A supplements should be provided to the cows.
Feed Patterns
The feed patterns of a dairy cow might differ from a beef cow as it produces about 5 to 10 gallons of milk per day. The lactation period for a dairy cow is nine months with a three month dry period. A dairy cow also consumes about 100 pound of feed per day which is way more than a beef cow and also requires the same energy, vitamin, protein supplements as the beef cow. Dairy cows also require high quality roughage such as alfalfa hay. This would cater to their needs for protein.
The most important thing which needs to be considered is that all cows should have access to fresh and clean water as they drink about 50 gallons of water per day. Therefore, if proper care is taken then the beef cows will produce fast and healthy growing calves and dairy cows will produce large quantities of milk.