Animal feed is

food Food is any substance consumed by an organism for Nutrient, nutritional support. Food is usually of plant, animal, or Fungus, fungal origin and contains essential nutrients such as carbohydrates, fats, protein (nutrient), proteins, vitamins, ...

given to

domestic animal This page gives a list of domesticated animals, also including a list of animals which are or may be currently undergoing the process of domestication and animals that have an extensive relationship with humans beyond simple predation. This includ ...

s, especially

livestock Livestock are the Domestication, domesticated animals that are raised in an Agriculture, agricultural setting to provide labour and produce diversified products for consumption such as meat, Egg as food, eggs, milk, fur, leather, and wool. The t ...

, in the course of

animal husbandry Animal husbandry is the branch of agriculture concerned with animals that are raised for meat, animal fiber, fibre, milk, or other products. It includes day-to-day care, management, production, nutrition, selective breeding, and the raising ...

. There are two basic types:

fodder Fodder (), also called provender (), is any agriculture, agricultural foodstuff used specifically to feed domesticated livestock, such as cattle, domestic rabbit, rabbits, sheep, horses, chickens and pigs. "Fodder" refers particularly to food ...

and

forage Forage is a plant material (mainly plant leaves and stems) eaten by grazing livestock. Historically, the term ''forage'' has meant only plants eaten by the animals directly as pasture, crop residue, or immature cereal crops, but it is also used m ...

. Used alone, the word ''feed'' more often refers to

. Animal feed is an important input to animal agriculture, and is frequently the main cost of the raising or keeping of animals. Farms typically try to reduce cost for this food, by growing their own,

grazing In agriculture, grazing is a method of animal husbandry whereby domestic livestock are allowed outdoors to free range (roam around) and consume wild vegetations in order to feed conversion ratio, convert the otherwise indigestible (by human diges ...

animals, or supplementing expensive feeds with substitutes, such as

food waste The causes of food going uneaten are numerous and occur throughout the food system, during food production, production, food processing, processing, Food distribution, distribution, Grocery store, retail and food service sales, and Social clas ...

like spent grain from beer brewing. Animal wellbeing is highly dependent on feed that reflects a well balanced nutrition. Some modern agricultural practices, such as fattening cows on grains or in feed lots, have detrimental effects on the environment and animals. For example, increased corn or other grain in feed for cows, makes their

microbiome A microbiome () is the community of microorganisms that can usually be found living together in any given habitat. It was defined more precisely in 1988 by Whipps ''et al.'' as "a characteristic microbial community occupying a reasonably wel ...

s more acidic weakening their immune systems and making cows a more likely vector for ''E. coli'', while other feeding practices can improve animal impacts. For example, feeding cows certain kinds of seaweed, reduces their production of methane, reducing the greenhouse gases from meat production. When an environmental crisis strikes farmers or herders, such as a drought or

extreme weather Extreme weather includes unexpected, unusual, severe weather, severe, or unseasonal weather; weather at the extremes of the historical distribution—the range that has been seen in the past. Extreme events are based on a location's recorded weat ...

driven by climate change, farmers often have to shift to more expensive manufactured animal feed, which can negatively effect their economic viability. For example, a 2017 drought in Senegal reduced the availability of grazing lands leading to skyrocketing demand and prices for manufactured animal feed, causing farmers to sell large portions of their herds. Additionally agriculture for producing animal feed puts pressure on land use: feed crops need land that otherwise might be used for human food and can be one of the driving factors for

deforestation Deforestation or forest clearance is the removal and destruction of a forest or stand of trees from land that is then converted to non-forest use. Deforestation can involve conversion of forest land to farms, ranches, or urban use. Ab ...

soil degradation Soil retrogression and degradation are two regressive evolution processes associated with the loss of equilibrium of a soil health, stable soil. Retrogression is primarily due to soil erosion and corresponds to a phenomenon where succession revert ...

and climate change.

Fodder

Fodder Fodder (), also called provender (), is any agriculture, agricultural foodstuff used specifically to feed domesticated livestock, such as cattle, domestic rabbit, rabbits, sheep, horses, chickens and pigs. "Fodder" refers particularly to food ...

" refers particularly to foods or forages given to the animals (including plants cut and carried to them), rather than that which they forage for themselves. It includes hay,

straw Straw is an agricultural byproduct consisting of the dry wikt:stalk, stalks of cereal plants after the grain and chaff have been removed. It makes up about half of the crop yield, yield by weight of cereal crops such as barley, oats, rice, ry ...

silage Silage is fodder made from green foliage crops which have been preserved by fermentation (food), fermentation to the point of souring. It is fed to cattle, sheep and other ruminants. The fermentation and storage process is called ''ensilage'', ' ...

, compressed and pelleted feeds, oils and mixed rations, and sprouted grains and

legume Legumes are plants in the pea family Fabaceae (or Leguminosae), or the fruit or seeds of such plants. When used as a dry grain for human consumption, the seeds are also called pulses. Legumes are grown agriculturally, primarily for human consum ...

s. Grass and crop residues are the most important source of animal feed globally. Grains account for 11% of the total dry matter consume by livestock at global level and oilseed crops by-products such as soybean cakes account for 5%. The amount of grain used to produce the same unit of meat varies substantially between species and production systems. According to

FAO The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations; . (FAO) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations that leads international efforts to defeat hunger and improve nutrition ...

, ruminants require an average of 2.8 kg of grains to produce 1 kg of meat while monogastrics require 3.2. These figures vary between 0.1 for extensive ruminant systems to 9.4 in beef feedlots, and from 0.1 in backyard chicken production to 4 in industrial pig production. Farmed fish can also be fed on grain and use even less than poultry. The two most important feed grains are

maize Maize (; ''Zea mays''), also known as corn in North American English, is a tall stout grass that produces cereal grain. It was domesticated by indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 9,000 years ago from wild teosinte. Native American ...

and

soybean The soybean, soy bean, or soya bean (''Glycine max'') is a species of legume native to East Asia, widely grown for its edible bean. Soy is a staple crop, the world's most grown legume, and an important animal feed. Soy is a key source o ...

, and the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

is by far the largest exporter of both, averaging about half of the global maize trade and 40% of the global soya trade in the years leading up the 2012 drought. Other feed grains include

wheat Wheat is a group of wild and crop domestication, domesticated Poaceae, grasses of the genus ''Triticum'' (). They are Agriculture, cultivated for their cereal grains, which are staple foods around the world. Well-known Taxonomy of wheat, whe ...

, oats,

barley Barley (), a member of the grass family, is a major cereal grain grown in temperate climates globally. It was one of the first cultivated grains; it was domesticated in the Fertile Crescent around 9000 BC, giving it nonshattering spikele ...

, and

rice Rice is a cereal grain and in its Domestication, domesticated form is the staple food of over half of the world's population, particularly in Asia and Africa. Rice is the seed of the grass species ''Oryza sativa'' (Asian rice)—or, much l ...

, among many others. Traditional sources of animal feed include household food scraps and the byproducts of

food processing Food processing is the transformation of agricultural products into food, or of one form of food into other forms. Food processing takes many forms, from grinding grain into raw flour, home cooking, and complex industrial methods used in the mak ...

industries such as

milling Milling may refer to: * Milling (minting), forming narrow ridges around the edge of a coin * Milling (grinding), breaking solid materials into smaller pieces by grinding, crushing, or cutting in a mill * Milling (machining), a process of using ro ...

and

brewing Brewing is the production of beer by steeping a starch source (commonly cereal grains, the most popular of which is barley) in water and #Fermenting, fermenting the resulting sweet liquid with Yeast#Beer, yeast. It may be done in a brewery ...

. Material remaining from milling oil crops like peanuts, soy, and

corn Maize (; ''Zea mays''), also known as corn in North American English, is a tall stout Poaceae, grass that produces cereal grain. It was domesticated by indigenous peoples of Mexico, indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 9,000 years ago ...

are important sources of fodder. Scraps fed to pigs are called slop, and those fed to chicken are called chicken scratch. Brewer's spent grain is a byproduct of beer making that is widely used as animal feed. is fodder that is blended from various raw materials and additives. These blends are formulated according to the specific requirements of the target animal. They are manufactured by feed compounders as ''meal type'', ''pellets'' or ''crumbles''. The main ingredients used in commercially prepared feed are the feed grains, which include

soybeans The soybean, soy bean, or soya bean (''Glycine max'') is a species of legume native to East Asia, widely grown for its edible bean. Soy is a staple crop, the world's most grown legume, and an important animal feed. Soy is a key source of f ...

sorghum ''Sorghum bicolor'', commonly called sorghum () and also known as great millet, broomcorn, guinea corn, durra, imphee, jowar, or milo, is a species in the Poaceae, grass genus ''Sorghum (genus), Sorghum'' cultivated for its grain. The grain i ...

, oats, and

. Compound feed may also include premixes, which may also be sold separately. Premixes are composed of microingredients such as vitamins, minerals, chemical preservatives,

antibiotics An antibiotic is a type of antimicrobial substance active against bacteria. It is the most important type of antibacterial agent for fighting pathogenic bacteria, bacterial infections, and antibiotic medications are widely used in the therapy ...

, fermentation products, and other ingredients that are purchased from premix companies, usually in sacked form, for blending into commercial rations. Because of the availability of these products, farmers who use their own grain can formulate their own rations and be assured that their animals are getting the recommended levels of minerals and vitamins, although they are still subject to the Veterinary Feed Directive. According to the American Feed Industry Association, as much as $20 billion worth of feed ingredients are purchased each year. These products range from grain mixes to orange rinds and beet pulps. The feed industry is one of the most competitive businesses in the agricultural sector and is by far the largest purchaser of U.S. corn, feed grains, and soybean meal. Tens of thousands of farmers with feed mills on their own farms are able to compete with huge conglomerates with national distribution. Feed crops generated $23.2 billion in cash receipts on U.S. farms in 2001. At the same time, farmers spent a total of $24.5 billion on feed that year. Bush-based_animal_feed

With progressing climate change and reoccurring droughts, extensive rangeland agriculture increasingly suffers of forage shortage. Innovative approaches to substitute forage include the harvesting and processing of shrubs into animal feed. This has been extensively researched and applied in Namibia, using waste biomass resulting from woody encroachment. In 2011, around 734.5 million tons of feed were produced annually around the world.

History

The US Animal Drug Availability Act 1996, passed during the Clinton era, was the first attempt in that country to regulate the use of medicated feed. In 1997, in response to outbreaks of Bovine spongiform encephalopathy, commonly known as mad cow disease, the United States and Canada banned a range of animal tissues from cattle feed. Feed bans in United States (2009) Canada (2007) expanded on this, prohibiting the use of potentially infectious tissue in all animal and pet food and fertilizers.

Forage

Manufacture

Nutrition

In agriculture today, the nutritional needs of farm animals are well understood and may be satisfied through natural forage and fodder alone, or augmented by direct supplementation of nutrients in concentrated, controlled form. The nutritional quality of feed is influenced not only by the nutrient content, but also by many other factors such as feed presentation, hygiene, digestibility, and effect on intestinal health. Feed additives provide a mechanism through which these nutrient deficiencies can be resolved, improving animal rate of growth, health, and well-being. Many farm animals have a diet largely consisting of grain-based ingredients because of the higher costs of quality feed.Merck Manual October 2014
Nutritional Requirements of Beef Cattle
Accessed March 18, 2015.Merck Manual March 2012

Accessed March 18, 2015.

Major ingredients

Chelates

Insects

Soy

By animal

* Bird feed *

Cat food Cat food is food specifically formulated and designed for consumption by cats. During the 19th and early 20th centuries, cats in London were often fed horse meat sold by traders known as Cats’ Meat Men or Women, who traveled designated routes ...

* Cattle feeding * Dog food *

Equine nutrition Equine nutrition is the feeding of horses, pony, ponies, mules, donkeys, and other Equus (genus), equines. Correct and balanced nutrition is a critical component of proper horse care. Horses are non-ruminant herbivores of a type known as a "hin ...

* Fish feed * Pet food *

Pig farming Pig farming, pork farming, pig production or hog farming is the raising and breeding of domestic pigs as livestock, and is a branch of animal husbandry. Pigs are farmed principally for food (e.g. pork: bacon, ham, gammon (meat), gammon) and l ...

* Poultry feed *

Sheep husbandry Sheep farming or sheep husbandry is the raising and breeding of domestic sheep. It is a branch of animal husbandry. Sheep are raised principally for their meat ( lamb and mutton), milk (sheep's milk), and fiber (wool). They also yield sheepskin ...

References

External links

Animal feed legislation and guidance

Infographic: A look at the global feed production 2012
{{Authority control Animal husbandry Medicated feed Intensive farming