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Examining the issues of importance to animals, humans and the environment to help those across the food production system better understand the issues from a science-based perspective.
ONE Health Live
Evolving role of veterinarians in beef cattle nutrition
Veterinarians are finding themselves at a fascinating crossroads where animal health meets nutrition science. Dr. Sara Linneen, Beef Technical Consultant with Elanco, dives into this evolving landscape where veterinarians are increasingly becoming trusted advisors on cattle nutrition, especially in cow-calf operations where dedicated nutritionists may be scarce.
The conversation reveals practical approaches to answering common nutritional questions that veterinarians face. Dr. Linneen walks through the step-by-step process of determining cattle nutrient requirements using cooperative extension resources, then calculating actual nutrient delivery by analyzing feed composition and intake. Her mathematical approach transforms complex nutritional concepts into actionable insights that veterinarians can immediately apply.
Perhaps most illuminating is the discussion around selecting the "best" feed or mineral options. Dr. Linneen dispels the myth of a one-size-fits-all solution, emphasizing instead how each operation's unique resources, labor constraints, and production goals must shape recommendations. She provides a framework for evaluating supplements on a pound-per-nutrient basis to ensure true cost-effectiveness. The episode also tackles the often-confusing world of medicated feed labels, offering guidance on finding, interpreting, and applying this critical information correctly.
The data point that 20% of cow-calf operations are consulting veterinarians with nutrition questions underscores the significance of this trend. While encouraging veterinarians to expand their nutritional knowledge, Dr. Lineen advocates for continued collaboration with formally trained nutritionists, creating partnerships that benefit the entire production system. This holistic approach represents the future of cattle care – where health, nutrition, and management converge to enhance efficiency and sustainability across the beef industry.
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Welcome to One Health Live, where we examine the topics of importance to animals, humans and the environment. Our goal is to help those across the food production system better understand the issues at hand from a science-based perspective. In One Health Live, we strive to be thought-provoking and fact-based, as we bring you the latest news and insight. This episode of One Health Live is brought to you by Elanco Animal Health, a global leader dedicated to improving the health of beef cattle by supporting the prevention, control and treatment of disease. I'm Sarah Muirhead, and with me today to dig into some of the burning questions that veterinarians in the beef industry have a lot of times is Dr Sarah Linneen, Beef Technical Consultant with Elanco. Welcome, Sarah, Great to have you with us today.
Dr. Sara Linneen:Thank you so much. I appreciate being here.
Sarah Muirhead:So let's dig into some of those questions that you're hearing out there and kind of, you probably just hear them on a repeat and it's good to get some answers out there. So let's let's start by asking the question what cattle? What do cattle? Veterinarians need to know when it comes to how many nutrients cattle are receiving and and, for that matter, how should they be receiving them.
Dr. Sara Linneen:That's a question I get often from the veterinarian community and we are seeing an increase in the number of veterinarians that are giving input on nutrition, especially pre-feed yard. So in the cow-calf sector and growing cattle sectors of the industry we are seeing that veterinarian tapped as a technical resource not just for health but also for nutrition, because there's not a lot of consulting nutritionists in that space that are available for that producer. So it's putting a little bit of pressure on veterinarians to sharpen their saw a little bit in that skill set area. And one of the questions that I get commonly that you mentioned is hey, how do I know what my cattle are receiving and how do I know if that's how much they should receive? And for me it's not super simple. So there is a little bit of thought and math that goes into it. But one of the greatest resources to figure out how much your cattle need of every nutrient on a percent and a pound basis is cooperative extension. If you Google or you go to your local land grant university, they have excellent resources that say this cow or this growing animal at this stage of production needs this much protein, this much energy on a pound and percent basis and they will extend that to minerals and other nutrients, so it's a great resource. So that's where you can start and say, okay, this is what I need. Now what do I have? And I had to figure out what I have by looking at the nutrient composition of every source of nutrition I have. So that's forage, that could be hay, that could be mineral, whatever that looks like, and you can use analytical laboratories. So send a sample in. They'll send you a sheet back and it tells you what's in there. Or you can rely on a local feed mill to give you a spec sheet, or a nutritionist if you have it, or just rely on published values.
Dr. Sara Linneen:So if I'm using fescue, we generally know the composition of fescue, so you can also look that up online pretty easily. So if I'm using fescue, we generally know the composition of fescue, so you can also look that up online pretty easily. So that tells you what you have. But the key here is you have to multiply by intake. And so if I have a 30% cube that I'm going to feed my cows today and I'm going to give every cow two pounds to figure out how much protein she is getting, I have 30% protein. So 0.3 times two pounds. That will give me my protein per day in a pounds basis and I can compare that back after I add the protein content of the forage to what she needs and say, yes, I'm doing good or no, she's a little bit under, depending on where she's at in her cycle. So two parts to that. You have to do a little bit of work, but just remember to do that multiplication. It all depends on what that animal's eating.
Sarah Muirhead:And it can change, as you indicate, based on the nutrient content of some of the ingredients and sometimes we see changes to in the recommendations that are made out there. So just don't always assume. But to do that checking, do that analysis, great, great advice. What about when it comes to feed or mineral? How do you determine what's best, what's the? You know what's the best way to kind of look into that and say, hey, this is what's right for me.
Dr. Sara Linneen:Sure. So this is the most common question that I receive is what is best? And the answer is there is no best. There's probably 50 bests, because we're really dealing with resource management, especially in cattle that are grazing or utilizing some sort of forage. Often cattle are the byproduct, so we're trying to get rid of X resource using cattle because they're going to upcycle it, and so it's a resource management game. So that makes it so the best for producer A may not be the best for producer B, so those veterinarians are really going to have to stay, stop and look at it on an individualized basis and figure out this is the best option for this person.
Dr. Sara Linneen:We often will see people do what they've done year after year. So I have this resource that's a base of forage and then I'm going to go and buy this supplement and I encourage people to always look at it on an annual basis, because soil composition changes, forage changes, as you just mentioned. Feeding, manufacturing and diet formulation changes. So the options are becoming more plentiful and it's really key to look at best under that person's specific conditions. So what resources do I have? What animals do they have? What are we asking those animals to do in terms of productivity. And then what are my labor resources? What can I deliver? How often can I deliver that? And then what are my feed resources?
Dr. Sara Linneen:So if I'm buying a supplement from some sort of feed manufacturer and I found out by looking at the composition of my forage that I'm short of protein, then I need to go look for a protein supplement.
Dr. Sara Linneen:Those are not going to be the same, so I might be able to buy a cube, I might be able to buy a tub, I might be able to buy a commodity mix. I want to assess that on a pounds per nutrient basis. So that way I'm comparing apples to apples and I'm also considering intake. So if I can feed one pound of my tub every day, but I have to feed four pounds of my cubes spread across three different days, how does that compare if my protein content is different? Um, so really honing in on what you need, because we don't want to spend excess money. Okay, right, we want to be efficient, especially with feed, which is often the largest cost of any operation. So that best is going to be determined by what they have available, what is nearby, what they're missing in terms of deficiency and how they're closing that gap by way of supplementation programs.
Sarah Muirhead:Excellent advice. Now, when we add a medicated product to the feed, it gets probably a little more confusing, especially when we start talking about some of those feed labels. You've got, you know, different labels for different levels. You've got like the type A label, and that's probably where a lot of the questions come from. How do you advise veterinarians to learn about those, to pay attention to those, to consider what's on those labels? What's your advice when it comes to medicated feed labels?
Dr. Sara Linneen:Absolutely so. When we talk about medicated feed labels, we're talking about medicated feeds that are under the umbrella of the FDA. So some examples of this would be Tylen, optiflex, remensin, experier would be a few, and so they were part of an approval program by the FDA that was long and extensive, and a part of that is making sure that it is approved for the right reason. It's going to be used responsibly and used on label, and so being able to interpret what that label is and find it to start with is pretty key to recommending the product. So these labels are not intended to be confusing or complicated, but often they are for someone that doesn't have formal nutrition training. So here's where we don't want to diminish the use of the nutritionist. There's still the gold standard. I say phone a friend as a veterinarian If you can get, if you can get to the first base you know as a nutritionist, and then phone a friend for the rest of that, especially when it comes to medicated feed labels. So finding them they are on FDA's website. They are also on the manufacturer's website. So if you're looking at a Reminson label, go to elancocom and you will find that label.
Dr. Sara Linneen:Now, interpreting it is key because it's going to tell you dose, duration, class of cattle. It can be fed to cautions, warnings, mixing information. That's all key to being able to recommend it appropriately and there is some math involved. So for any feed additive X, let's say it's 20 grams per ton. That's not how much the feed mill or the feed mixer would need to add and that's not going to tell us how much in terms of milligrams per head per day are being consumed. There's math required to go through all of those steps and sometimes that has to be penciled out and I see veterinarians will save that information so they could do it again on their next try. So definitely ask for help with those labels. They're not intended to be complicated, but sometimes they are and being able to interpret them is really key to appropriate use of the product and that's what we want to happen. We want it to be used on label, for the label claim in which it's intended to be used for.
Sarah Muirhead:Whether one's a cattle veterinarian or involved in the cattle industry in another way, such as a producer or rancher out there. Asking questions is how we all learn and we find solutions, so I guess we should just encourage folks to always seek those answers if they have those questions and, as you say, phone a friend or or phone phone your, your tech service person, whoever it is where you need to get some answers. Any final thoughts to leave our audience with here today?
Dr. Sara Linneen:I think I'll just leave with. We are seeing a change in the industry. We're seeing nutritionists and veterinarians work together more. We're seeing overlap within those different segments and some of the data will show that cow-calf operations of at least 50 cows in size are calling veterinarians at least 20% of the time with a nutrition question. That's a huge number. That's very frequent, and so I think if there's any sort of continuing education, if you can reach out to resources like what Elanco has with some of their nutritionists that are willing to do these trainings to really continue to heighten that education, don't diminish the nutritionists right, they're still formally trained, with often a lot of years of grad school under their belt to get there, so use them appropriately. But also, I think anytime we can serve the cattle industry by really looking at how health interacts with nutrition, with management, we're all going to be better at the end of the day in terms of efficiency of cattle production and being able to supply protein in a responsible way.
Sarah Muirhead:Our sincere thanks to Dr Sarah Linneen, beef producer. Beef technical consultant. I'm sorry with Elanco. Thank you for joining us here today on One Health Live. This episode has been brought to you by Elanco Animal Health, a global leader dedicated to improving the health of beef cattle by supporting the prevention, control and treatment of disease. I'm Sarah Muirhead and you've been listening to One Health Live. If you would like to hear more conversations about some of the big issues affecting the livestock industry, subscribe to this podcast on your favorite podcast channel. Until next time, have a great day and thank you for listening.