Distillers grains in dairy cattle diets
Co-product utilization in livestock diets is expanding due to expansion of the biofuel and milling industries. These co-products can contain valuable nutrients such as protein, carbohydrates, and minerals that can be utilized in dairy cattle diets to minimize the cost of the diet. These co-products included dried distillers grains (DDG), dried distillers grains with solubles (DDGS), wet distillers grains (WDG), and condensed distiller solubles (CDS) from dry-grind ethanol plants. Fractionation of the corn prior to grinding will result in a wide array of new co-products for livestock diets. These co-products will include corn bran, high-protein DDGS, and corn germ. Wet milling plants also produce a wide array of co-products such as corn gluten meal and feed. Many wet milling plants may also produce ethanol and consequently, distillers grains. With the expansion of biodiesel, there is also interest in utilizing the glycerol produced as a co-product of biodiesel production. Thus far, there is limited recent information about glycerol utilization in dairy cow diets. In the future there could be many more types of co-products that can be utilized in dairy cows diets.
Information provided within this website contains research results of work that has been conducted in the Dairy Science Department at South Dakota State University.
