Swine expert touts leftovers for pig diet

Distillers dried grains and bread or cookie waste products can be used for feed, nutritionist says.

If soybean and corn-based feeds get too expensive, livestock producers can always turn to leftovers.

Hans Stein, a University of Illinois Extension swine nutritionist who speaked at the Illinois Pork Expo at the Peoria Civic Center, said the leftovers he's talking about may be available at different locations around the state.

Stein said distillers dried grains, a byproduct of the ethanol industry, are becoming more available to Illinois producers as additional ethanol plants go into production in Illinois.

Producers can include up to 20 percent DDGs in feed for hogs, he said. "In some cases, we could probably feed as much as 30 to 40 percent DDGs (to hogs) but there's no research to prove it yet," said Stein

As corn and soybean prices continue to rise, feed prices have grown in the past year from 45 percent to almost 55 percent of total input costs for state livestock producers. "This is a very regional solution. Producers have to see what's available in their area," said Stein.

But ethanol plants aren't the only sites producers should call, he said. "The waste products of other industries such as a bread company or cookie plant can also make good swine feed. Some plants will almost give (waste products) away," he said.

A baker in St. Louis, Stein added, offered two truckloads of bread a week free to anyone who could transport it. "You can formulate a diet that's 20 to 30 percent bread for hogs," he said.

Midwestern livestock producers need to learn what others have learned in other parts of the world, said Stein. "U.S. grain prices are still lower than anywhere else in the world."

Livestock producers in the Midwest have been resistant to change from corn and soybean meal as the chief feed ingredients, said Stein. "But high grain prices are probably here to stay. Producers should be prepared to make an upfront investment to handle different kinds of feed," he said.