The feeding industry’s nearly insatiable appetite for grain might be enough incentive for farmers to grow high-yield feed barley varieties for hungry hogs and steers.
Many farmers grow lower-yielding barley varieties that may qualify for malt, hoping to cash in the premium, but malting barley premiums in the 1998-99 crop year are weak.
Most barley crops usually end up as feed anyway because they don’t meet maltsters’ requirements. Nor is the barley good enough for some feeders.
Scoular Canada is offering an open contract across the Prairies for certified feed barley that could pay a $2 to $4 per tonne premium.
Read Also
Feeder market adds New World screwworm risk premium
Feedlots contemplate the probability of Canadian border closing to U.S. feeder cattle if parasite found in United States
Scoular is signing farmers to grow the Secan variety, CDC Dolly, a plump feed barley that averages 53 pounds a bushel and has been well received by feeders.
“Some of our customers are really demanding the high, plump, high test weight barley,” said Rob McNaughton, regional manager for Scoular in Calgary.
CDC Dolly yields 10 to 15 percent more than two-row Harrington, the most popular malting variety. Moisture averages 14.8 percent.
Feed barley has become a good cash crop for western farmers.
“There are three demand centres in Western Canada developing,” said McNaughton.
The highest prices in the country are in southern and central Alberta, as well as southern Manitoba’s expanding hog sector.
“The way the Canadian Wheat Board set their PROs for malt this year, your return per acre will likely be higher growing feed,” said McNaughton.
As cattle feeders in Alberta and hog finishers in Manitoba learn more about animal feed efficiency, they demand a better quality grain.
Feeders like Western Feedlots at High River, Alta., have strict specifications for feed.
“The feedback we get from them (feeders) is that they like to deal with companies that move grain directly off farm,” said McNaughton.
They don’t like blended 48 lb. barley because it may contain slim kernels from 42 lb. barley. The poor kernels don’t get processed properly and it is a waste with little nutritive value.
Dolly is the third most popular feed variety grown in Alberta. It is a semi-dwarf type which produces shorter straw that can hold a heavy head of kernels.
