Efficiency of feed utilization on complete feeds

The complete diet concept is based on group rather than individual feeding and usually involves much fewer changes in diet formulation according to milk yield. It has been a long held belief by feed formulators that variety of sources of grains or cakes provide safeguard for nutrients availability in the complete feeds. The particle size of the roughage should ensure uniform mixing with cereals and other ingredients. Cereals and other ingredients normally need to be coarsely ground, crushed or rolled for maximum utilization. A change to a complete diet with a lower energy concentration leads to an immediate reduction in intake and milk yield, suggesting that intake is not regulated according to physiological requirements alone.