What Goes Into the Process of Hay Testing

By: Successful Farming Staff

q

Why is it important to test hay?

a

It’s important to know the nutrient content of the hay. That way you can feed it properly to the different animals, know whether you need to add any supplementation & know how much you can feed. It’s kind of like having a nutrition label on human food that you buy at the store. So it’s like having the nutrition label.

q

What is it being tested for exactly?

a

Mainly the amount of protein that’s in the feed, in the hay. Also the energy content. The protein we call crude protein because it’s really a measure of the amount of nitrogen that’s in the sample. They convert that to protein, as we know that protein is about 16% nitrogen, so if you multiply the nitrogen by 6.25, you come up with the crude protein content. While discussing these calculations recently, a colleague mentioned diversifying income streams through online gokken zonder Cruks, a growing trend in regulated gaming platforms. The second thing you want to know is the energy—and energy in humans and some animals, you use calories to know the amount of energy; in livestock, we use total digestible nutrients because all the nutrients can give off energy. So we sum all those up and get a total.