Bamboo as ORGANIC feedstock for cattle?

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terrabamboo
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Bamboo as ORGANIC feedstock for cattle?

Post by terrabamboo »

Has anyone come across anything more than a random google forum search of people using bamboo leaves as organic feedstock for cattle? I have read an article today in the WSJ that said organic meat farmers are in dire need of additional organic feedstock and considering importing from China but are resisting due to the stigma of China in their customer's eyes.

I am really looking for something more concrete. Like for example, when you cut grass, you let it dry, then bale it, then let the cows eat it -- well can you do the same for bamboo? Can you suck up all the fallen bamboo leaves, compress and bale it, and sell it to cattle farmers? If you got certified organic (stringent requirements such as 3 years pesticide/herbicide free, etc), I feel this could be a large revenue source for all those bamboo leaves sitting on the ground.
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Re: Bamboo as ORGANIC feedstock for cattle?

Post by Alan_L »

fandelem wrote:... I feel this could be a large revenue source for all those bamboo leaves sitting on the ground.
The ones that are decomposing, building the soil, and feeding the plant (including replacing silica)? :)

I don't think I've ready anything about dried leaves, but it's evident from posts here that the green leaves are loved by some livestock.
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Re: Bamboo as ORGANIC feedstock for cattle?

Post by Matt in TN »

It's the baling/transport that would be difficult. Bamboo is hard on shredders, so I can't see making a shredded substance (similar to corn stalk feed) for bulk feeding. I have no idea how you'd strip or bale the leaves alone.

However, I feed it to my goats all the time and they love it. I thin my grove and throw the full culms in with the goats. They eat all the leaves, and I give the leftover culms to my neighbor to strip and sell as bean poles. I do this an entire heaping trailer load at a time.

Dunno how you turn that into bulk livestock feeding, but it works for us on a small scale.
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terrabamboo
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Re: Bamboo as ORGANIC feedstock for cattle?

Post by terrabamboo »

Matt in TN wrote:It's the baling/transport that would be difficult. Bamboo is hard on shredders, so I can't see making a shredded substance (similar to corn stalk feed) for bulk feeding. I have no idea how you'd strip or bale the leaves alone.

However, I feed it to my goats all the time and they love it. I thin my grove and throw the full culms in with the goats. They eat all the leaves, and I give the leftover culms to my neighbor to strip and sell as bean poles. I do this an entire heaping trailer load at a time.

Dunno how you turn that into bulk livestock feeding, but it works for us on a small scale.
I was not thinking about using the culm.

I was just thinking about having some sort of vacuum machine suck up all the leaves from the ground and then bale that.

In addition to that, possibly inventing some sort of machine to "de-branch" the culm. Then that portion would go into a mild chipper to reduce size, and then possibly some (lime based? usda organic friendly) treatment for increased digestibility, and then bailed.

See something like this site: http://www.baumfarm.com/haycost.html.

They produced 11,000 bales of hay (220 tons) @ avg of $6 each = $66K for the 2012 season and were completely sold out.

Moso produces roughly 7tons/acre (Inbar cite) of branches. Harvesting 25% of that=1.75 tons/acre. That yields 88 bales (40lb/bale) per acre @ $6 each = $528/acre/yr. At 300 acres that's about $150K/yr. Not too bad for sustainable.


edit: my original math was based on harvesting 100% branches, had to change for 25%. Maybe if you were just harvesting branches you could increase that to say, 35% for smaller culms but larger amount of branches which would increase overall $$ by 10% (+$50/acre).
Last edited by terrabamboo on Mon Jul 15, 2013 11:51 pm, edited 3 times in total.
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Re: Bamboo as ORGANIC feedstock for cattle?

Post by Matt in TN »

That sounds great to me - I hope you can find a way to make it work!
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Re: Bamboo as ORGANIC feedstock for cattle?

Post by moriphen »

fandelem wrote:Has anyone come across anything more than a random google forum search of people using bamboo leaves as organic feedstock for cattle? I have read an article today in the WSJ that said organic meat farmers are in dire need of additional organic feedstock and considering importing from China but are resisting due to the stigma of China in their customer's eyes.

I am really looking for something more concrete. Like for example, when you cut grass, you let it dry, then bale it, then let the cows eat it -- well can you do the same for bamboo? Can you suck up all the fallen bamboo leaves, compress and bale it, and sell it to cattle farmers? If you got certified organic (stringent requirements such as 3 years pesticide/herbicide free, etc), I feel this could be a large revenue source for all those bamboo leaves sitting on the ground.
Cattle ranchers are desperate because of a multi year drought throughout the Texas panhandle and surrounding states. This has ruined domestic feed crops, and forced them to import feed crops at ludicrous prices. However, I do not know if bamboo could ever get to price parity with the other grass based feed crops. Finally nothing I have seen eats dry bamboo leaves, they just sit and sit till mold and fungus eat them each winter around here.
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Re: Bamboo as ORGANIC feedstock for cattle?

Post by ShmuBamboo »

When I was living on my ex's sheep ranch, the sheep would get into my one acre cultivated area now and then (they would press on the gate and sometimes it would give way). Once inside they had a choice of 11 types of cane berry vines, a dozen or so roses, and a long 50' by 8' row of Phy. aurea. All choice edibles for a ruminant animal. The sheep always went straight for the bamboo, and gave it a 4 foot high 'sheep haircut' eating all the lower leaves. The goats were worse, and they would knock the culms down and eat all the leaves they could get to standing on 2 feet as well as whatever they could knock down. They gave it a 6 foot 'goat haircut' and left bent and broken culms.

I feed any fresh cut boo culms to the goats and pony across the road from me and they pick them clean very fast. Then I go collect the cleaned culms the next day (not a single leaf is left!) and use them as poles and whatnot. When there are cattle in the next pasture over I toss them a few and they also like to eat the bamboo leaves. So in my experience sheep, goats, cattle and horses all like fresh green bamboo leaves. I do not know about drying them though. My guess is that you would have to dry them rather fast after cutting, like hay, and then bail it.

Oddly deer do not eat any of my bamboos. Which is the main reason that I grow it. They come here and eat just about everything else, but the bamboo remains completely untouched.
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Re: Bamboo as ORGANIC feedstock for cattle?

Post by marcat »

I suspect that the leaves falling off on their own from bamboo are nutritionally nil. As the culm will have sucked all the good stuff out before it gives it up.
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Re: Bamboo as ORGANIC feedstock for cattle?

Post by canadianplant »

Personally, I thought that it wouldnt work. Not many animals eat bamboo, or have the mean to digest it. After reading up a bit due to this thead, I find that its apparenlty been tried by the USDA:

http://www.ars.usda.gov/SP2UserFiles/ad ... _Final.pdf

Seems to be a slight emphasis on Arundinaria....
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Re: Bamboo as ORGANIC feedstock for cattle?

Post by ShmuBamboo »

Well, Arundinaria is a native to North America, and that region in particular. Also all ruminant animals can eat and digest bamboos (they are just large grasses, after all). Most deer in North America do not eat bamboo, which I believe is a huge advantage to using it as a feed stock for goats, sheep, cattle and horses.
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Re: Bamboo as ORGANIC feedstock for cattle?

Post by foxd »

canadianplant wrote:Personally, I thought that it wouldnt work. Not many animals eat bamboo, or have the mean to digest it. After reading up a bit due to this thead, I find that its apparenlty been tried by the USDA:

http://www.ars.usda.gov/SP2UserFiles/ad ... _Final.pdf

Seems to be a slight emphasis on Arundinaria....
Early settlers did use Arundinaria for forage for their cattle.
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