Last updated on February 15th, 2024 at 01:24 pm
The overwhelming thought of winter feed costs is on the minds of ranchers across the nation. What will it take to ensure you stay profitable, your herd stays healthy, and your ranch sustains success?
At Riomax®, our goal is to help ranchers become more profitable and more sustainable. Our tubs are designed to be highly concentrated, low consumption, and low cost to feed. And because we do protein differently, Riomax® is a tool to help you to get far more out of your existing forages, which is of all importance when winter feed costs are looming over you.
How exactly does Riomax® help reduce winter feed costs?
✓ Low Consumption
✓ Grazing Management Tool
✓ Complete Mineral Package
✓ Doing Protein Differently
Wintering Cows
Winter feeding is, as we know, the most expensive part of raising cattle. Many parts of the country have insufficient forages to get through winter, especially if you get hit with severe weather and heavy snow. It is important to build up reserves in your cows and heifers so they can make it through winter in good rig, in view of spring and spring calving.
It’s all about doing the right thing for your herd through the winter, but doing it with a ‘lowest cost, highest return’ approach.
Consumption
Lick tubs are notorious for having high, hard to control consumption. That also means a high, hard to control cost per head per day. Riomax® tubs are low consumption by design. The reason for low consumption is because it is a highly fortified product. This directly correlates with low consumption and a low cost per head per day. It is all backed up by the Costguard® consumption guarantee. In the end, what appears to be a high priced tub, is arguably one of the lowest cost per head per day tubs on the market.
Let’s talk about consistent intake. With weather conditions like snow, wind, and many other factors, cows need to be on a good, solid program 24/7. The beauty of Riomax® is a low, consistent intake day in, and day out. You don’t have to worry about getting out there in the middle of a 3-day blizzard because you know your cows have continual access to the product.
For those of you who have had negative experiences with underconsumption or overconsumption, we know how frustrating it can be. Rest assured with the Costguard® consumption guarantee, which takes the risk off of your shoulders. On Riomax®, your cows should consume between ⅛ and ⅓ of a pound per head per day. That depends on your forage quality; the balance that the cows’ diet consists of. Cows will self-regulate with our Forage Balancer® technology. In other words, they’ll adjust their intake of the tub, relevant to the balance in their diet.
Grazing Management
Everybody is interested in getting more out of every mouthful, and so you should be. But, more and more people are catching on to the importance of better-managing your resources and land-base. Because of the Riomax® science, you can use the product as a cattle distribution, cattle management, or grazing management tool. Whether you need to suck cows into under-utilized parts of your pasture, move cattle around, or pull them further from water, you can use Riomax® supplements as a tool to better manage your resources.
Some ranchers use Riomax® tubs in BLM allotments, forest service, or mountains. The concern comes up: it’s hard to lug heavy tubs to remote locations.
No need to worry.
Riomax® has tubs of all sizes; from 250lb to 125lb, and down to 60lb, including the new BioBrix™. BioBrix™ is a 60lb biodegradable tub; ideal for packing on horses and using in mountain pastures. The varying tub sizes and packaging options make it easy for you to pick a product that will work for your management style throughout this fall and winter.
Complete Cattle Mineral Package
Unlike many products on the market, the Riomax® program has a complete, A-Z mineral package included in every tub. This means you can feed the tubs to take care of your protein and energy needs, as well as to help better utilize your forages and manage your grazing. All the while, you’re getting a complete, quality mineral program into your cattle. The Riomax® mineral program is called Esqort®, which consists of 100% rumen-bypass protected trace minerals: copper, zinc, manganese, and selenium. Our goal is to give them the highest scientific chance of getting into the bloodstream, which is key for getting your cattle through winter, helping in the 2nd trimester, and moving into the 3rd trimester.
With the ⅛ to ⅓ lb consumption rate, Riomax® tubs will deliver precisely the amount of mineral, trace mineral, and vitamins that your cows need through the winter.
Doing Protein Tubs Differently
It is well known throughout the industry that Riomax® does protein differently. With a traditional, direct-fed tub, cows typically eat half a pound, a full pound, or even a pound and a half. We’re not saying direct-fed methodology is wrong, we’re just saying that there is another way to do. A way that is more in-tune with Mother Nature.
Indirect Supplementation Technology
The Riomax® technology uses Nutrizorb®, a multi-component digestion pack. This feeds the rumen microbes so they can do a better job of breaking down the forage that your cows are consuming. Nutrizorb® means better nutrient extraction, more protein, and more energy pulled out of every single mouthful, every single acre, every single day.
The technology is known as IST; indirect supplementation technology. It is feeding the rumen bugs, rather than feeding the cow.
Feed the troops that win the war.
That’s the first step of IST: stimulating and hyper activating the good bugs. This creates more of them and they’re more active, so they do a much better job of breaking down forages.
According to studies done by the University of Minnesota, Nutrizorb® increased the TDN - total digestible nutrients - by 3% across varied grasses and grains.
Microbial Protein
The second part of this equation is something known as microbial protein; true protein. Microbes in the rumen naturally die off. They only have about a 20-minute lifespan, but they keep repopulating. The point here is, when you hyper activate and stimulate the rumen bugs and microbe population, there’re more of them when they’re alive. Eventually, that means more of them when they die, and that directly correlates to an increased microbial protein level.
A cow gets 30-80% of her daily protein requirements from microbial protein. However, when we stimulate the amount of microbial protein produced, she gets even more of her daily protein needs naturally; hence, she depends less on what you feed her; her forages. Ultimately, it helps you, the rancher run with a lower input cost throughout the winter with no detriment or negative effect on performance.
Reduce Winter Cattle Feed Costs By Utilizing Your Existing Resources
The biggest trick in driving your input cost down through winter is to get more out of what you’ve already got. We’ve already mentioned how Riomax® helps get more out of your cows, improves their digestive efficiency, and increases microbial protein. The second part of it is impacting ranchers who have stockpiled forages and grazing aftermath. The more you can utilize and optimize those stockpiled forages and aftermath, the less you have to depend on hay. To put it another way, the more we use what you already have, the further off you can push your hay date. Ultimately, this drives your winter feeding costs down.
Riomax® is an option for ranchers looking to run lean and mean through winter, without hurting cow performance. By using a complete, holistic approach, you can get more out of what you’ve already got, create more microbial protein, and improve grazing management and cattle distribution.
The kicker here is to better utilize what you’ve got, get more out of what you’ve already got, and drive your winter feed costs down.
Take control, stay in the driver’s seat, and bring profitability back to ranching.