Sweet Times For Cows As Gummy Worms Replace Corn Feed

PolygamousRanchKid writes "As the worst drought in half a century has ravaged this year's U.S. corn crop and driven corn prices sky high, the market for alternative feed rations for beef and dairy cows has also skyrocketed. Brokers are gathering up discarded food products and putting them out for the highest bid to feed lot operators and dairy producers, who are scrambling to keep their animals fed. In the mix are cookies, gummy worms, marshmallows, fruit loops, orange peels, even dried cranberries. Cattlemen are feeding virtually anything they can get their hands on that will replace the starchy sugar content traditionally delivered to the animals through corn. Operators must be careful to follow detailed nutritional analyses for their animals to make sure they are getting a healthy mix of nutrients, animal nutritionists caution. But ruminant animals such as cattle can safely ingest a wide variety of feedstuffs that chickens and hogs can't. The candy and cookies are only a small part of a broad mix of alternative feed offerings for cattle. Many operators use distillers grains, a byproduct that comes from the manufacture of ethanol."

Comments

Cows eat Grass

[TechyImmigrant]

Cows evolved to eat grass.

No good came from feeding them corn. I can't see how feeding them gummy worms will turn out well.

Re:Cows eat Grass

[Hatta]

Cheap beef came from feeding cows corn. A median income family in the US could eat beef for dinner every day because of corn fed cows. These days it's getting out of reach.

Although, I am a bit worried about what this will do to gummy worm prices.

Re:Cows eat Grass

[Hatta]

If I eat beef every two days will I live twice as long? If not, I think you're practicing false economy. Beef is delicious. If you're trying to extend your life by avoiding pleasurable things, you're missing the point of life.

Re:Cows eat Grass

[avandesande]

The prime food for dairy cows in the east is 'silage' which are the entire corn plant chopped up and fermented in the silo. You could pick kernels of corn out of the silage and if you chewed it a little alcohol would come out.

Re:Cows eat Grass

[ackthpt]

No good came from feeding them corn

Lol, wut?

I.e. fattening them up. Changed the entire industry of cattle from range fed (grasses) to loading them up with Corn, which is a water-hungry crop. With the mentality of Wall Street, the cattle industry has gone after maximizing profits - steroids to fatten them up even more, antibiotics (which remain in the meat, even after cooking, so you end up with antibiotic resistant strains developing, not to overlook constant exposure to antibiotics hammers your own immune system) and a dependency upon water and petroleum, it's becoming less suitable to areas of land as the damage to land can be considerable, plus it has brought us the wonders of invasive plant species, thanks to feed coming from where-ever is cheap and available.

Re:Cows eat Grass

[ackthpt]

If I eat beef every two days will I live twice as long? If not, I think you're practicing false economy. Beef is delicious. If you're trying to extend your life by avoiding pleasurable things, you're missing the point of life.

The amount of beef you need to eat on a daily basis for your protein needs would be a cube (raw) is about 1.5 inches on a side, anything after that is just clogging up your colon and your arteries. It's shocking, at least to me, to see people ordering huge steaks, which do more harm to their health than they are aware of. If you like to eat it, add it to things, like stir-fry or stew, and by all means go for organic or free range meat, not that stuff loaded with steroids and antibiotics (gotta keep that fat bull alive long enough to get to the slaughterhouse.)

Re:Cows eat Grass

[fm6]

Corn-fed beef is cheaper, so if you eat a burger every day, you can't complain about it.

Then again, all this meat consumption (over a pound per U.S. resident per day; about 25% of it beef) is really a bad thing. Screws up your health, screws up the environment, depletes a non-renewable resource (oil) in the form of fertilizers and diesel fuel needed to grow all that corn.

The oil issue was pumping up corn prices even before the drought. Oil prices can only go up, so we're going to have to get used to eating less meat, no matter how "anti-agriculture" it might seem.

Re:Cows eat Grass

[Anonymous Coward]

The land doesn't suffer if it is managed properly. Research holistic land management. The Savory Institute is a good place to start. Here in Colorado, a few ranchers are making their cattle graze in patterns that the bison do naturally: grouped tighter together, never staying in the same area for very long. In any given area, the cattle don't eat too much or poop too much. They trample the ground just enough, pushing seeds just below the surface. The grass has evolved to grow optimally under these conditions. Animals and land have a symbiotic relationship; both benefit from each other. If we use animals as a tool to make a healthier earth, we all win.

Re:Cows eat Grass

[Byrel]

I.e. fattening them up. Changed the entire industry of cattle from range fed (grasses) to loading them up with Corn, which is a water-hungry crop.

Bah. Corn's photosynthesis cycle is more than 10 times as efficient as grass's. Sure it's a water hungry crop; it's just a much less land hungry crop for the same production, which means less land area under cultivation per cow. Less land per food is a Good Thing when people are starving in some parts of the world. Less land per food means lower food prices and higher availability (given a reasonably free market.) It also means less erosion, less pollution, less CO2 release, and higher population average leisure time.

All the things you mentioned do, indeed, increase profits. But they also lower costs, both to produce and to consume food. You can claim we should eat less meat, as it has relatively high impact on the environment per pound; you're right. But it would have even more impact if we switched to 'organic' or 'grass-fed' meat. There may be good reasons to buy organic; it may be healthier, lower risk of E. coli, more humane treatment of animals, and it just plain tastes good! But recognize, that whenever you indulge these scruples, you do it at the cost of the environment.

Re:Cows eat Grass

[samazon]

Cows eat grass huh? You realize that corn is of the genus Zea which makes it... a type.. of grass.

Re:Cows eat Grass

[tomhath]

Corn is a species of grass. It produces more calories per acre than most other grasses, which is why it's used for feed (and why it takes more water per acre than other grasses, more output requires more input).

Re:Cows eat Grass

[paiute]

antibiotics (which remain in the meat, even after cooking

Citation needed.

http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/jf00047a035

http://mbioblog.asm.org/mbiosphere/2012/08/antibiotic-residues-in-fermented-sausage-meat-target-beneficial-bacteria-leave-pathogens-alone.html

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2134130/

Re:Cows eat Grass

[TheLink]

Beef is not good for health. So don't eat it often, but if you're going to eat beef, pick the most enjoyable form for you. Otherwise you're just wasting your life and the beef.

If you don't like it, don't eat it. But if you really like steaks, unless you're really unlucky or unhealthy or stupid[1], a steak dinner every month or three isn't going to kill you that fast. Every week would probably be pushing it but some research would need to be done ;).

[1] stupid = eating way too much, like a kilo.

Re:Cows eat Grass

[h4rr4r]

No one is building stripmalls in Iowa or apartment complex in East Bumblefuck Texas.

Re:Cows eat Grass

[Sarten-X]

The structures that allow cows to eat a wide diet predate their domestication (by about 20 million years), so the breeding (which is really just human-guided evolution) is irrelevant.

Cows (and other ruminants) are effectively omnivores whose meat has been replaced by eating their own gut bacteria. Grasses are a good food because they feed the gut bacteria while providing an entirely different set of nutrients directly to the cows. When the cows then digest the bacteria, they get the high-protein supplement they need. Any other feed that provides roughly the same nutrition to the cow is suitable, because a different species of bacteria will thrive on it, and the symbiosis remains.

Re:Cows eat Grass

[Aranykai]

If you ever drive through East Bumblefuck Texas, you would be shocked just how much building there is going on. /Texan who lives just outside East Bumblefuck Texas.

Re:Cows eat Grass

[englishknnigits]

I'm not sure about your colon but it won't clog up your arteries. Vegetarian and other high carb diets actual result in higher levels of LDL cholesterol, particularly small dense (aka very bad) LDL cholesterol, and VLDL cholesterol. Look up Stanford's "A TO Z: A Comparative Weight Loss Study." All of the biomarkers for health and longevity were the same or better for people on the Atkins diet than all the other diets. That being said, throwing in lots of leafy greens and other vegetables would make it even better. So, you actually aren't far off except you can/should eat more meat than 1.5 cubic inches of the stuff a day. Fish would be better but beef isn't bad, especially if it's grass fed.

Re:Cows eat Grass

[Lemmy Caution]

The pleasure center of the brain is a notoriously unreliable guide to decision making. Look at compulsive gamblers, crack addicts, and people with massive consumer debt - not to mention those who are obese for dietary reasons - as an indication. You may want to try to get some executive function over that shit.

Re:Cows eat Grass

[WGFCrafty]

I.e. fattening them up. Changed the entire industry of cattle from range fed (grasses) to loading them up with Corn, which is a water-hungry crop.

Bah. Corn's photosynthesis cycle is more than 10 times as efficient as grass's. Sure it's a water hungry crop; it's just a much less land hungry crop for the same production, which means less land area under cultivation per cow.

I stopped reading after the first sentence.

Corn IS a grass. It is a monocot and it is in the family poaceae.

Traits like it's kernal size were developed through selective breeding over a few thousand years. It used to look more like the long stalks of other grass. Botany 101

Re:Cows eat Grass

[cayenne8]

I largely agree with you, but in recent months...am altering my life a bit, especially with regards to eating.

I've done a coupe of 30 day juice fasts this year (inspired by Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead documentary)....and I must say, what it did for me...was it got me to enjoying vegetables and fruits more...the basic flavors.

I'm now exploring ways (I love to cook) to make my diet more plant based, but satisfying and fun to cook and eat. So far, it is working out.

I'd not be able to stay on a strict diet, if I didn't enjoy it...the 'pleasure' as you mentioned. While it is hard to beat a good chunk of med-rare, prime grade NY Strip....I'm reserving it more and more, as a 'treat' type dish. I'm going more quality over quantity as I get a bit older.

I'm finding good prime grade steaks...and those go for about $23/lb easily...so, I'm not chowing on those daily...but every couple weeks as a fun weekend treat? Sure!!

I mean, I just bought a brand new 'bandera' style offset smoker....I recently bought a pro-level Hobart meat slicer, I'm not going vegetarian.

But I am looking at moving more towards that way if I can be successful in making the food fun to eat. I'm getting to the age in my life where I need to find balance...because in the next year or two, I'll be setting the course for the quantity and quality of the 2nd half of my life...I want it to be as long as possible, and I want to be in condition to enjoy every day of it I can, as much as I do now.

And, I think that means looking at nutritional habits. So, figuring to start now to explore ways to make healthy eating something I WANT to do.

Don't get me wrong, I like to eat a 16" pizza in one sitting, and then go knock out half a bottle of good single malt scotch...and you know, on occasion, I still may do that from time to time.

But it has to be the outlier and not the general rule for long, healthy life.

Re:Cows eat Grass

[Hatta]

Executive function is a great means to increase total pleasure, but pleasure is still the ultimate goal.

Re:Cows eat Grass

[ackthpt]

antibiotics (which remain in the meat, even after cooking

Citation needed.

http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/jf00047a035

http://mbioblog.asm.org/mbiosphere/2012/08/antibiotic-residues-in-fermented-sausage-meat-target-beneficial-bacteria-leave-pathogens-alone.html

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2134130/

These and other references were brought to my attention at a time I had recently recovered from, yet another Streptococcus throat infection, where I could scarcely swallow for three days. I decided to give up beef, chicken, pork and rely only on fish caught in the lakes or ocean. Over a period of two years I did notice the severity of respiratory infections decline and when I did take antibiotics they actually worked. Though anecdotal, I did recall antibiotics had little to no effect before I changed my diet. Eventually a dairy allergy would remove all cheese, yoghurt, milk from my diet and I find the period from initial detection of a respiratory infection to recovery to be down to less than a week, where I once would suffer these occurances for up to two weeks. I believe there is merit to these studies, particularly regarding the constant presence of low levels of antibiotics in the body creating a breeding ground for resistant strains (which are on the rise) and leaving my immune system impared to some degree, as all antibiotics are toxins which target certain organisms, but also have a degree of collateral damage (killing non-bacterial cells.)

Re:Cows eat Grass

[curiousJan]

Although, I am a bit worried about what this will do to gummy worm prices.

I assume they're getting gummy worms cheap from some other process that would be disposing of them, perhaps surplus or stale. Competing with retail would, I imagine, be ruinously expensive.

The gummy worms themselves start as corn, via corn syrup. If corn is going up, eventually the gummy worms are going to be more expensive as well. There may just be some lag time as the price increases work their way through the system. (Gummy worms, being shelf stable, are probably more resistant to price shocks than cows are.)

When I was young, we raised day-old calves to approximately a year-old before selling them at auction. Part of their feed mix was stale/malformed gummy candies from the local candy factory. Dad doesn't that any more (most likely from risk of CJD), but during that time period CJD wasn't a concern here in the US. And yes, he did it was because it was more cost effective. You've nailed it on the head ... they would be discarded otherwise, and they're made from the same corn sugars that the cows would get from corn.

Re:Cows eat Grass

[Byrel]

Errr... Does that mean when people are talking about grass-fed beef, they really could mean corn-fed? Grass has more than one meaning, depending on scope. OBVIOUSLY I was not speaking of all plants which could be called grasses biologically, but was instead using it in the colloquial sense. In which corn is not grass at all.

All semantic nitpicking aside, corn is a C4 plant, grass is a C3. Major difference in efficiency. Of course, sugarcane is even more efficient, but it's a bit hard to grow around here.

Re:Cows eat Grass

[cayenne8]

(using soy cheese, as I'm allergic to dairy)

While not putting you down for this....I understand the lactose problem thing....but it did make me think of something the other day, what was bothering me as I study vegeterianism, and especially when looking into vegan-ism....how they are starting to almost come back around the 'curve' so to speak, and eating heavily processed foods?!?! I've seen them eating meat substitute things, that looked like they'd been in the lab and processed as much as HFCS imbibed Twinkies, or some other artifical foodstuff.

One thing I was looking to do, in addition to eating more of my normal meals as plant based, was to get myself even further from highly processed foods, than I already was.....

That being said, I can see soy products (milk, tofu and cheese) as not being too highly refined as products go....I'm not giving up cheeses, I just want to cut out crap daily ones, and reserve my cheese times to special ones...good cheese like you find at the Whole Foods cheese mart...or even a local place like The St. James Cheese Co......

Like all good things...quality over quantity, eh?

Buy grass fed only...

[Kenja]

Not only does it taste better, but corn and "alternative" feed is directly linked to the evolution of resistant ecoli strains. Only reason to feed cows corn, or corn sysup in the form of gummy worms, is due to farm subsides making corn literally cheaper then weeds.

Re:Buy grass fed only...

[Kenja]

corn and "alternative" feed is directly linked to the evolution of resistant ecoli strains

It is? I would have had the overuse and abuse of antibiotics in factory farms pegged as the cause to antibiotic resistance in E. Coli.

Strage as it sounds, yes it is. There have been a great many scientific studies and articles published on the subject since the mid 80s. Basically it comes down to how the cows dont have the digestive system to handle the grains which results in PH changes in their stomaches allowing e.coli to thrive and survive being "passed" by the cows. The resulting e.coli laden excrement gets stuck to the cows and does not properly get washed off during processing into meat. The solution the beef industry came up with was to wash the meat in ammonia rather then switch to grass feed even for a couple weeks towards the end of the cows life.

Re:Buy grass fed only...

[Byrel]

This doesn't help develop resistant E. coli; it helps E. coli get into our food. Antibiotic-resistant E. Coli develops the same way any resistance does in a population: strong selective pressure. In this case, the only significant source of selective pressure is antibiotics. Now, I don't know if factory farms abuse antibiotics or not. But heavy use of antibiotics is the only thing known to develop significant populations of antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

Re:Buy grass fed only...

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, he left out that part: the rich diet which causes this e. coli bloom in the cow's stomach can make them sick, so the agribusinesses will often add in a steady schedule of antibiotics to keep the cow "healthy" despite the bad diet. This leads to the development of resistant strains.

Re:Buy grass fed only...

[jburroug]

You're both right.

E. Coli naturally lives in the bovine digestive track and older strains of it had no tolerance to a highly acidic environments - a grass fed ruminate's stomachs have a fairly neutral pH - and so weren't a threat to humans if we consumed any. Feeding cattle a lot of corn lowers the pH in their stomachs enough that E. Coli strains have now evolved enough of an acid tolerance to survive in our guts and do bad things to us.

Cattle get sick a lot easier with the more acidic stomachs, since they never evolved a digestive track capable of handling strong acids, which is only exacerbated by the conditions they live in at the feedlot so they have to fed antibiotics by the shovel full every day just to survive long enough to be slaughtered. Thus the now acid tolerant E. Coli also gets a chance to evolve tolerance to a wide array of antibiotics.

Finally modern slaughter houses run so fast, mostly with untrained immigrant labor, that they can't even be bothered to butcher the animals carefully enough to avoid getting shit all over the meat. The shit contains E. Coli and when you eat this meat (especially meat ground at the factory) you end up eating some of this infected shit.

Cheers,

Organic insulin.

[AuralityKev]

I insist we only use organic insulin for all of the newly diabetic cows! It's sustainable... or something.

Re:Organic insulin.

[fakeid]

I insist we only use organic insulin for all of the newly diabetic cows! It's sustainable... or something.

I'm sure Wilford Brimley will be along at any minute to help out our diabeetus-stricken cows.

You're eating your own feet and bones.

[Anne_Nonymous]

Sounds like a great CJD transmission vector.

Re:You're eating your own feet and bones.

[Anonymous Coward]

Whoever modded this as 'troll' is a moron who doesn't know what gelatin is, where it comes from, and what it is put into.

Re:You're eating your own feet and bones.

[Penurious Penguin]

Yes, a vector indeed. Gummy worms comprising of gelatin, and gelatin comprising of bone and bone -- other than brain -- being the most common vector for rogue prions, you may have a point. What's undeniable, however, is that feeding gummy-worms to cows is cannibalism -- a diet that has been largely discouraged since it was discovered as a possible connection with BSE. Gelatin manufacturers claim to treat the gelatin in a manner which "minimizes" the risk of transmission, but I have always had serious doubts. I think Japan and Korea have doubts too, which is probably why they've banned US beef in the past, or still do.

Chickens can so hav cookie!

[Byrel]

I grew up on a small farm with free-range chickens. Chickens are omnivores. They aren't quite as good at digesting weird things as ruminants, but they come pretty close. Consider that both are quite well adapted for eating grass. It's tough to get much in the way of nutrition out of grass, but they both manage it. In fact, their digestive systems bear some similarities. While a ruminant will puke up there food to reprocess it in their mouth, the chickens have a gizzard for a pre-stomach. The gizzard is full of rocks, and has a strong band of muscles around it which grinds the food apart before it ever gets to their stomach.

Furthermore, we fed our chickens scraps. You have to, as the summary points out, be careful with nutrition. Chickens will gorge themselves on moldy bread, cookies, etc. instead of proper food if you give them a chance. But if you're careful to not feed them too much junk at a time it can be quite economical, and the chickens love it. We used to get rejected hamburger buns and feed it to them. There's nothing quite so amusing as tossing a single bun into the air, and watching all the chickens scattered across a couple acres come barreling up to you, flapping and squawking.

This isn't new, and it isn't really news. I'm sure it happens more now, as the designed food gets more expensive, but it's an old practice.

Obligatory Charlton Heston

[jspoon]

Just don't tell them where the gelatin came from.

Re:Let Them Eat Cake

[LMariachi]

Gummi worms are fit for human consumption?

Re:Let Them Eat Cake

[ddd0004]

It's by far easier to get the food to the cows. Feeding most of those who die of malnutrition involves the following:

1. Get together enough food.
2. Send an armed force to overthrow the government or local warlord who is ruling the area where people are dying of malnutrition. If not, the ruling party will simply claim the food or stop the aid.
3. Deliver the food
4. Remain in the region indefinitely to keep the peace all the while the local region becomes more and more dissatisfied with the outside invaders and the casualties continue to mount.
5. Eventually leave the region and watch the warlords / corrupt governments return or civil war breaks out.

So in this case, feeding the cows gummy worms doesn't sound like that bad of a deal.

if we have another mild winter..

[wierd_w]

They should raise buckwheat on some of their pasturage, and encourage the corn growers to do so too.

Buckwheat has a bulk starch content of approximately 70%, bulk protein (including lysine, making it more complete than corn) of about 18%, and a fair amount of vegetable fats.

Its real claim to fame is that it goes from germination to harvest in a little over 2 months, and thrives on poorer soils. It prefers cool weather, and usualy produces about 30bu/acre.

It also improves soil nutrient availability to other crops planted later.

If it doesn't freeze in the corn belt again this year, like it didn't last year, it would be a good crop to attempt, as it could easily offset feed costs, and avoid "graining" their cattle on refuse gummybears.

On a side note... remember that post from last month about the complex system theorist predicting food riots?

Re:NOOOOOO!

[fruitbane]

I'm an American and I love food. I eat a wide variety of plants and animals and, yes, I do often have a problem with eating too much of it. But I do have taste buds, I do appreciate quality food, and I'm capable of both eating and differentiating between food at the top AND the bottom of the food quality scale.

Generalizations like this, especially in such heated terms, really do nothing for meaningful discussion. Then again, it's pretty clear from the tone of your comment that you're not interested in discussion. You're interested in being superior to everyone else. Good job. Work on your grammar and sentence structure a bit and maybe someday you'll actually impress upon someone that you are superior.

Re:Computers Weren't Meant to Exist Either

[h4rr4r]

So far the free market has not done that. I doubt it ever will, the free market tends to prefer cheap and fast over good. When we had a free market in medicine we had snake oil being sold.

The lowest information actors will be sacrificed over and over, and not for the gain of the rest of society, but for the gain of the wealthiest few.