Where does animal feed come from? Understanding the origin of your animal feed can help you pick better feed for your animals. It can also help you understand when and how to use grain processing equipment to make your own livestock feed.

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The 2 Types of Animal Feed

Not all animal feed is the same. Usually, animal feed is broken into two categories:

• Concentrates

• Roughage

Concentrates are foods with a high concentration of energy. Most often, these are highly processed foods like pellets that are enriched through the addition of numerous ingredients and byproducts.

Roughage is food with relatively low concentration of nutrition. This includes pasturage, hay, and silage. Roughage is valuable for raising ruminant animals like cows, horses, and sheep. Not only does roughage cost less than concentrates, it is critical to the healthy function of the ruminant digestive tract.

Basic Grain Processing

Cereal grains are the most common ingredient in concentrate animal feeds. In fact, corn alone accounts for more than 50% of all animal feed.

While animals can eat cereal grains without processing, grinding corn for feed makes it easier to digest, which increases the energy animals get from the grains.

Basic grain processing means running a grain through a mill to crack, roll, or grind it. This processed grain is then fed to animals directly.

This simple operation is efficient in speed and cost, but it does come with potential problems. Whenever grain is processed, it can create undesirable byproducts such as dust. During processing, dust has the potential to ignite or explode. After processing, dust can simply blow away, which leads to a significant loss in the value of feed grains. Plus, dust can be bad for animals, leading to ulcers in the mouth, throat, or stomach.

When feeding animals processed grain, it's best to remove the dust or use a processing method that creates less dust, like a roller mill.

Making Animal Feed Pellets

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While dust is a problem for basic grain processing, it can be valuable in trying to pelletize grain. The dust can mix with liquid ingredients to help act as a binder to hold pellets together.

The dry grain is mixed with liquid ingredients, then squeezed through a pelletizer. The pellets are then baked to remove moisture, leading to a dry, stable, high-energy food.

Pellets are commonly purchased. However, some people like to make their own pellets to reduce the cost as well as control the quality of and ingredients in the food they feed their animals.

Hay vs. Silage: Two Methods of Processing Roughage

Although pasturage is the least expensive form of roughage for ruminants, it's not always available. Winter dramatically reduces the availability of pasturage, so roughage must be processed to make it available year-round. There are two methods of processing roughage: hay and silage.

Hay is a low-moisture processing technique. Grasses and legumes are harvested before they produce seed, then dried. This is usually a passive process, letting the sun and wind do the work. Making the grain dry prevents the growth of mold in the grain.

Silage, on the other hand, is stored wet. The wet plants are placed in airtight storage. When the moisture content is right, this produces acetic and lactic acids that prevent the growth of mold. When done properly, silage can last longer than hay.

Are You Looking to Make Your Own Animal Feed?

Purchasing animal feed is expensive and reduces your control over what your animals eat. Making your own animal feed can improve the quality and profitability of your animal husbandry operation.

The first step in making your own animal feed is getting a quality grain roller mill. Roller mills have taken over the grain production industry due to their highly efficient, consistent production methods and their ability to process all types and sizes of grain. To learn more about the basics of roller mills, check out our long-form article on what roller mills are and why they're a great choice for producing animal feed.

At Automatic Equipment Manufacturing, we have nearly a century of experience in helping people find the right grain mill for their operation, no matter the size. Please contact us today to find the best grain mill for you.

Cattle Feed Production Process and Machines

What are cattle feed pellet?

Cattle feed production process is an all-inclusive pellet form feed ideal for cattle reared for meat and milk. Rich in nutrients, minerals and proteins, cattle feed pellet is instrumental in enhancing milk and beef production as well as overall health of the livestock.

Ingredients for making cattle feed pellet

The feed can be made using ingredients such as oil cakes, and agro-residues like maize straw, wheat bran, grass, grain, cereals...etc.

Cattle Feed Production Process

As stated earlier the production of cattle feed pellet with the key operations in the production process being: preparation of the raw materials, crushing, mixing, and pelleting and pellets packaging.

1. First, the raw ingredients are stored in silos where they are readied for further processing. Then crushed by hammer mill into powder. The crushed mixture is separated using a sieve and subsequently stored in the dividing tanks based on the type of raw materials.
2. The next step is mixing the raw materials, and this is done using a feed mixer. This process is crucial as fatty ingredients are supplemented to the ingredients for the purpose of improving the overall nutritional value of the product.
3. The assorted feed which at this point after crushed is introduced to a feed pellet mill which forms the pellets.
4. The last thing to do is to package the finished cattle feed pellets.

Main cattle feed production machinery

• Feed hammer mill, utilized for crushing the raw materials into feed powder.
• Feed mixer also known as the feed mixing machine, adequately mixes the crushed materials to enhance the uniformity of the constituents.
• Additionally known as feed pellet mill is the key piece of equipment in this production process.

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• Feed pellet packaging and weighing machine for weighing the pellets and packing them uniformly.
• Other machinery required might be such as a pellet cooler, grease adding machine...but prevalent in automatic cattle feed plant.

Advantages of cattle feed pellet production

• From a manufacturer's point of view, the benefits include diminished segregation of assorted feedstuff, enhanced bulk density, improved handling characteristics and reduced dustiness.
• For farmers, making your own cattle feed is not only cheaper compared to buying, but it also reduces wastage around the farm, as the leftover can be utilized as raw materials for the feed.

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