John Miller

Regarding Vijay Swami's comments on berseem clover silage, more information might be needed to decide whether you should go to 100% berseem clover. The pH, lactic acid and ammonia levels appear to be in the normal or expected ranges. With 20% of the silage as a maize product, this might give you additional energy in the silage that you may not get with 100% berseem clover. It would be useful to l ...

Regarding the question from Abdelseed Ahmed regarding feed security in the dry season, it appears that the feed supply in the Blue Nile State is adequate or better during the rainy season but insufficient during the dry season. Have I understood the situation correctly? If that is the case, there may be several options available to secure and preserve forage supplies for use during the dry season ...

To John Patrick Mugaya's question on improving butterfat content in milk through feeding, this is a very broad area to address but here are a few key items to consider when trying to increase butterfat: 1. Check the diet to see if the requirements for major nutrients are being met adequately. Watch the levels of fat to make sure they are not too high and verify that NDF levels are adequate 2. Chec ...

To Ahmad's question on requirements for water buffalo, I have found a couple of sources that might be helpful to you. Here are two sites to check: http://www.lrrd.org/lrrd20/10/tufa20165.htm www.ajas.info/Editor/manuscript/upload/22-141.pdf These will give you some of the nutrient requirements for water buffalo based on several research trials and should give you a good idea of what kind of ration ...

Dr. Malik Muhammad Ali makes some very good points in response to Safdar Javed's question. We observe improved digestibility with ensiled forages. His comment about uniformity is very important also. We want to try to give the animals a feedstuff that has as little variation as possible from day to day. By properly ensiling the forage, whether it be corn, alfalfa, grass or small grain, we can bett ...

Dear Ahmad, Thank you for your questions. Here are the main areas that I would recommend concentrating on for putting up silage: 1. Corn Silage Dry Matter - try to harvest silage from 30-35% Dry matter; Goal of 32% dry matter 2. Chop Length - Most choppers in California will chop at 19 mm or 0.75 inches. That works well here and we can generally get a good pack. If particle size in your area is i ...