Paul Beck, Oklahoma State University Extension Beef Cattle Breeding Specialist, offers herd health advice as part of the weekly series known as the "Cow Calf Corner" published electronically by Dr. Peel, Mark Johnson, Parker Henley, Dr. Rosslyn Biggs and Paul Beck. Today Beck is talking about Growth Promoting Technologies for Beef Production

With the increased costs of beef production (especially feed and fertilizer) technologies that improve the efficiency of production are increasingly valuable. For example, if the total cost of producing an acre of cool-season annual pasture increased from $83/acre in 2001 to $170/acre, a 10% increase in average daily gain by stocker calves reduces cost of gain by 3-times more now than it did in 2001. Growth promoting technologies, such as implants and ionophores, are a very cost effective way to achieve these higher rates of performance of growing cattle.

In one study, steers were placed on wheat either after receiving an implant or were not implanted. Also, cattle in separate pastures were offered a non-medicated mineral, a mineral medicated with Rumensin, or pressed protein blocks medicated with Rumensin. Steers fed the non-medicated mineral that did not receive an implant gained over 2.3 pounds per day, which is excellent performance for grazing steers. But the implanted steers fed the non medicated mineral gained 2.7 pounds per day, an increase of 0.4 lbs per day! While implanted steers fed the medicated mineral or medicated pressed blocks gained 0.55 pounds more per day than control steers (fed the non-medicated mineral and did not receive an implant). Over a 100-day grazing period supplying an ionophore along with a growth promoting implant increased bodyweight gains by 55 pounds, a 23% increase in performance.