Feeding rice straw

[dcarp]

I just ordered a truck load of rice straw. Can't find any hay in this area of Texas.
Are there any things I should watch out for or do differently than hay.
I realize that the rice straw is low in protein so I will need to supplement.
Any thoughts on what and how much per head?
It's hard raising cattle in the desert!

 

[Howdyjabo]

http://anrcatalog.ucdavis.edu/pdf/8079.pdf

 

[dcarp]

Thank you Howdy. All the information I was looking for in one spot. Bottom line of this is the rice straw is a I can find. It was either that or sell the herd. Now I think I can work with it and hang on at least. My guys are going to bale as soon as they can following rice harvest so that should help with it's quality.
It's so dry here you have to drink water inside, take :cboy: it outside and it's gone before you can drink it

 

[TexasBred]

Now you need to decide what you plan to supplement the rice straw with.

 

[dcarp]

You're right about the supplement decision. Don't want to get to aggressive with the protein content in this heat. Thought about having the rice straw ground up and mixed with cotten seed cubes. Going to put the pencil to the various alternatives and see what looks best.
My first time being in this situation. The other dry years I had enough good quality hay to get through. Made as much as I could last year. Never thought it would be this bad.

 

[novatech]

Fella here bought some. It looked a little green when he went by.. The same day it caught fire. It all burned plus another hundred large rounds he already had. So make sure it was baled dry.

 

[Howdyjabo]

I'm lazy-- I know how to search for info and can do it faster than typing it all

Did you notice the conversion calculation for ADF to TDN
Thats a pretty useful one.

 

[dcarp]

I did see that. The more I get into this rice straw the more challenges I see, but then I guess it goes with the territory. The good news is that since it's so dry i'm not doing anything else so have time to workout all this. Thanks for all the info.

 

[jedstivers]

If you can grind it that's better. Fo you have a ethanal plant in your area? If so the syrup would be good to add to the ground straw.
This site has a lot of by-products, I know these places are to far away but it might give some of y'all an idea on something to feed that you hadn't thought of.
http://agebb.missouri.edu/dairy/byprod/bplist.asp