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OVERTON — Expanded safeguards against "mad cow disease" announced in late January by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration may require some East Texas beef producers to rethink their winter feeding budgets, says a beef cattle specialist with Texas Cooperative Extension. One of the safeguards, the ban on feeding broiler litter to cattle, will also raise winter production costs for many East Texas cattle producers, said Dr. Jason Cleere. Broiler litter is typically 20 percent protein, and cattle relish it once they become used to it. Cattle have been known to break down fences to get to a source of chicken litter. It's also cheap, from $15 to $25 per ton, compared to an alternative protein source such as range cubes that costs $225 per ton or more. "For beef producers, this equates to a change from about five cents to about 50 or 60 cents a day per head as protein supplement during the three to four-month winter feeding period," Cleere said. The exact cause of bovine spongiform encephalopathy, now commonly known as mad cow disease, is not known. However, many in the scientific community generally accept that a type of protein called prions causes BSE in mammals. The concern is that poultry feed often contains meat and bone meal, the same byproducts banned from cattle feed for fear they may transmit prions. Meat and bone meal are used in poultry feed as a cheap phosphorus supplement. "Although the prions would not be harmful to poultry, the worry is the prions might pass through the chicken and contaminate the litter. Also, there's quite a bit of spilled poultry feed that winds up mixed with the litter, too," said Dr. Gerald Evers, a forage management researcher with the Texas Agricultural Experiment Station. Evers has worked with broiler litter as a fertilizer source for bermudagrass pastures for years, and along the way has become familiar with the broiler litter industry. "We really don't know how much is fed, but we suspect that wherever there are poultry producers, there is quite a bit being used as a winter protein and mineral supplement," Evers said. Technically, the announced ban is only proposed until it is published in the Federal Register, the legal medium for communicating regulations by the executive branch of the federal government. When it is published, typically anywhere from two weeks to a couple of months following the announcement, it will become an "interim final rule." "Interim final rule" means the ban will be in effect as soon as it's published in the Register. There will be a public comment period, whose time and duration will be included in the publication. During this comment period, comments will be accepted and changes can be suggested. For example, there may be or may not be a grace period for producers currently feeding broiler litter to make the changeover. From all estimates, the ban, with a few minor edits, will survive the comment period. "The odds are the ban will be permanent," Evers said. "The feeling is that the ban won't be published in time to have an effect on this winter's supplemental feeding costs, but will most certainly be in effect by next winter," Cleere said. The message for the beef producer is to think twice about making capital investments in equipment to handle or store poultry litter, he said. "At least put it on hold for now," Cleere advised. Producers who are currently feeding broiler litter are advised to start thinking about some other winter protein supplement. Winter pasture is a good alternative. Though not as cheap as broiler litter, it is a cost-effective alternative. Also, there are other products available for use as supplemental feeds, such as corn gluten or wheat mids, Cleere said. The FDA also proposed a ban on using "plate waste," uneaten meat and other meat scraps collected from restaurant operations and rendered into meat and bone meal for animal feed. Another safeguard proposed by the FDA is requiring equipment, facilities and production lines to be dedicated to non-ruminant animal feeds if they use ruminant byproducts banned for use in ruminant feed. The FDA's ban on feeding most mammalian proteins to ruminant animals, including cattle, has been in effect in the United States since 1997. |
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