Straw of high value this year

By Brian Ashton, Senior Livestock Consultant, Rural Solutions SA, Pt Lincoln

This year farmers in many areas of Australia are struggling to obtain enough feed to keep their sheep or cattle through the drought.

While wheat or barley grain are usually the main feeds used in a drought, they are very expensive.

An alternative feed, that should not be overlooked, is straw. Many farmers who continuously crop paddocks would be glad to get rid of the straw in preparation of the paddock for next year. They can reap the crop lower than normal and then next morning bale the walker rows. There is very little extra cost or extra work.

Straw contains, on average, about 6.5 MJ of energy per kg. This is about half the energy level of a kg of wheat or barley. This means that straw can be worth as much as half the cost of wheat or barley - when used in an appropriate ration.

If wheat is the only grain available and costs $300 per tonne at the farm gate, then straw would be worth about $150 a tonne.

Straw cannot be used as a feed on its own because the stock just can't eat enough of it. They will gradually lose weight on pure straw. They may look okay, but a full gut is deceiving.

A ration of half straw and half grain would be ideal. For example, ewes in early pregnancy could be fed 2 kg of wheat and 2 kg of straw each a week. This would be a better than an all grain ration of 3 kg a week. In an experiment at Minnipa Research Centre, we compared rations using hay vs straw as the roughage. We assumed the straw had 70 percent of the feed value of the hay. The sheep receiving the straw maintained a higher weight and had less poor-doers than the hay rations. The best ration was 2 kg of barley and 2 kg of straw per sheep a week. There were no poor-doers in this treatment.

Straw can be treated with urea to increase the protein. Molasses can also be added, but at current prices this is not economic. Mixing instructions are in the Feeding Sheep book. The most important thing is to feed some grain with the straw.

As straw is less palatable than hay it is best fed in a feedlot. Start on hay and then, after two weeks, change to straw.

Straw is very valuable in maintenance rations. However, in finishing rations it has less value and hay is the best roughage to use. Hay is best for young sheep.

For advice on rations see the Feeding Sheep book or contact your nearest Rural Solutions SA Livestock Consultant.