SASKATOON – Farmers looking for a steady market for their feed peas should not ignore the local feed mill, says Henry Van de Velde.
The vice-president and grain buyer for Hytek in La Broquerie, Man., told a Pulse Days audience in Saskatoon earlier this year that his company uses a lot of feed.
“On a year where we can get a hold of feed peas, we ourselves will use two million bushels of feed peas,” said Van de Velde, whose company runs about 57,000 sows and hires 400 employees.
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Hytek produces about 20 percent of the hog feed manufactured in Manitoba, which means that if Hytek uses two million bushels of peas, the Manitoba hog feed industry can consume up to 10 million bu. of peas a year.
“I’d strongly encourage that you have contact information for these feed mills.”
He said field pea production continues to increase.
“In the mid ’90s, there were about a million tonnes of field peas grown in Saskatchewan and now there’s over two million tonnes, or 75 million bushels,” he said.
“In 2002, the average price was $210 per tonne and $120 per tonne in 2005 because of the big frost on wheat. In 2002, we were paying up to $250 per tonne for feed peas, delivered into La Broquerie. Today we pay about $190 per tonne.”
Van de Velde said peas are a high source of protein, with an amino acid profile between that of soybean and canola meal. They yield a similar energy and digestible lysine content hog diet, similar to mixing 40 percent soybean meal and 60 percent wheat.
“There’s a lot of other products out there – barley, canola meal, distillers grain, corn. Everything is relative. We punch our nutrient profiles into our formulation systems and every month we’ll enter the prices. From there, it will tell us what products we need to purchase,” he said.
“One thing we worry about in field peas is trypsin inhibitors, which lower the digestibility. The old Baroness, marrowfat or maple winter varieties are things we stay away from. They’re high in trypsin inhibitors. When some of those loads showed up, performance would back off in the barns.
“What we look for is anything less than two TUIs (trypsin unit inhibitors) per milligram. But it costs $140 to do a test for this. We prefer to ask the question: ‘what varieties do you grow?’ “
He also worries about the level of tannins in the peas.
“The bottom line is, if we put peas in our diets and our pigs are happy, then we’re happy. As soon as our pigs back off on performance, which is monitored weekly, then we start looking at where is the problem. Is it wheat, corn, vomitoxins?” he said.
“We have all the samples held, they’re all tested weekly, so we can go back into our histories and find out the issues. From there, we talk to our suppliers to try and identify these things.”
Van de Velde said one advantage with peas is that they pellet well because of the high starch content. As well, the heating from the pelleting process aids in the digestibility of protein.
“One disadvantage of peas: pea fibre has a low water holding capacity. That causes constipation if you make a switch too abruptly, particularly in sow diets,” he said.
“That’s why a constant supply pipeline is so important. Once we have peas in our diets at 20 percent, we want to keep them there every day. It’s tough to go from zero one week to 20 percent the next week. We won’t do it. If we feel this year we will only be able to access five percent of our diet in peas, that’s the maximum we’ll set it at for the next 12 months.”
Hytek produces 10 million bu. of feed a year, or 200,000 bu. a week, and peas can make up to 20 percent of that demand. Van de Velde said his biggest problem is finding 40,000 bu. of peas a week.
“Pricing 30 days in advance is important. Today we buy and store a million bu. and we’re willing to buy a lot more field peas from Saskatchewan. The key is having an up-to-date list of peas for sale,” he said.
“Feed peas for us are seldom purchased direct from the farmer. The reason is we don’t have a contact list of who to talk to, to get a consistent supply. That’s so important to us.”
Van de Velde encouraged his audience to look at forward contracting, the biggest reason being freight.
“Most feed mills have three to 10 days of storage for product. Even though we can hold 4,000 tonnes, we flip that quickly. We use 200 semi loads of grain and feed every week. We need to have a pipeline coming in consistently,” he said.
“Advanced purchases are needed to line up the freight. We have a fleet of six trucks, as backup, more than anything. I think we need 30 trucks to haul all our grain. Our biggest issue is we find the right price, but it’s to get the truck at the last minute. That makes it tough.”
He said he prefers 30 days advance notice to do an efficient job of lining up trucking and arrange back hauls. Hytek has mills in Killarney Man., Harvey, North Dakota, and Spiritwood, Sask., along with the home plant at La Broquerie.
Back hauls can include canola meal from Altona, Man., going to the Killarney plant, or creep feed manufactured in Manitoba and shipped to Spiritwood.
“In my opinion, ensuring a year round supply of peas is worth an extra $10 per tonne,” he said.
Hytek has a one page contract, stating what’s expected from both sides. Van de Velde said he’s open to working with customers who want to use their own contracts.
“With peas, we do not take dockage. We’ve never taken dockage off any grains coming in. We simply state for peas that foreign material needs to be below eight percent. Most guys have dockage in the two percent area. We’re saying don’t start mixing wheat mids or barley with your peas. It’s not splits we’re worrying about. It’s things that lower the nutritional value of the peas,” he said.
“Currently, we are offering $4 per bu. for feed wheat, landed into La Broquerie for next fall. We’ve already signed contracts for this. We’re looking at contracts in the area of $4.50 per bu. for peas. There will be a 20 to 30 cent discount landed into Killarney.
‘If anyone has trucks on your farm you want to use, we’re more than open to having f.o.b. prices at La Broquerie, on your farm, or whatever location you choose.”
With the expansion of the ethanol industry, Van de Velde said more distillers grain will becomes available to the feed industry.
“I think it will put pressure mostly on soybean meal. When it comes to peas, they fall more in the category of corn and wheat. Some reference points we use, corn and wheat are similar in value to us. We buy energy and protein. Peas hold a value roughly $15 per tonne above corn or wheat, delivered into the feed mill. From there, if one beats the other by $10, the percentage in our diets is a lot higher,” he said.
“I do know if we wanted to buy another load of distillers grain before April, we would not be able to at this point. It’s 100 percent sold out. It’s a high source of protein, primarily the corn distillers that comes up from the U.S. The wheat distillers, there’s an awful lot of freight that goes into it.”
