Sold 20 bulls today. Averaged 43 baht per kilo.(normally 46/47 Baht) The drop in price means I broke even, or even lost money.(must be something I forgot to factor in) Got me to thinking about reducing my feed costs. It's been on the back boiler for a while now, and this hit has brought it to the fore. A while back I mulled over Tim's offer on the dry food (thank you Maizefarmer), but a problem I have is that I need 4 different types of feed. Cows, bulls. calves and yearlings. All need different a different protien %. So.....make it myself would seem a logical solution. At the moment I use a 14% protien mix for all, from a dairy supplier @ 5.2 Baht per kilo. Not ideal. Too much for the bulls (wasting money) not enough for the calves, cows only get it as a supplament in the dry season, and yearlings are on reduced dry rations anyway......and way too expensive.

OK.....make my own. Where do I get the raw materials? Cassava, corn, molassas, salt, mineral mix (expensive ) all local. Where do I get soybean meal, fishmeal, bonemeal, palm kernal cake, etc...? I have just highlighted my own needs. Where do we get chicks, laying chickens, piglets, lambs, plant material, rubber trees, palm oil trees, vanilla...........vanilla??.....you get the idea.

I'll start this off.

Brewers grains. (the ingredient that puts milk in the pail.....according to one website ). The dairy stores in Muel Lek (pak chong) will deliver wet brewers grains @1700 Baht per ton....25 ton load. (will last 15 days according to them). Dry brewers grains @ 6,200 Baht per ton....7.5 ton load. current price.

Siam foods sell a pineapple waste mix, 7% protien, in 25 kilo bags, lasts for 6 months, @1,860 Baht per ton, factory gate price. You pay for transport. Their factory is in Chonburi. Price last May

http://www.siamfood.co.th/product4.html

I'll get you the number for the dairy stores later....fat lady is asleep right now and if I wake her just for you girls she's liable to punch my lights out .

Lambs....someone I know sells them per kilo....live of course. There's other stuff, but this post is long enough.....I need soyabean meal

regards

TT

Have to run - got some old cows who needs their breasts sucked! (time to milk) - will chaase this up later in the morning.

Tim

We do quite a lot of Casssava around here, I'll try and find out some prices, there's also a factroy doing 30kg bagged maize sialge, again I'll try and find out some details.

Anyone used that Siam foods pinapple silage, the price does'nt seem that bad.

It think with sourcing raw materials some of the problems are going to be transportation costs and having to buy in bulk, if you can't find things localy it can really bump the price up.

We do quite a lot of Casssava around here, I'll try and find out some prices, there's also a factroy doing 30kg bagged maize sialge, again I'll try and find out some details.

Anyone used that Siam foods pinapple silage, the price does'nt seem that bad.

It think with sourcing raw materials some of the problems are going to be transportation costs and having to buy in bulk, if you can't find things localy it can really bump the price up.

I bought 15 tons from them last spring. Very palatable. It would do well as a base for a dry food mix. Transport was 5,000 Baht. 220 klms

Sometimes we can get corn silage. (not at the moment) 1,600 Baht per ton delivered (45 klm). Can't get any straw at the moment and when I could it was 50 Baht per 15 kg bale

Shelled dry corn is 6,200 Baht per ton delivered from the local Sahagorn.

I was thinking about the corncobs. Same protien as rice straw. Could it be mixed with urea and molassas, same as the fang mak, and ensiled 15 days?

The last 2 weeks we've been buying whats left of the sweetcorn crop after picking. We cut and load it and pay 100 Baht per trailer. (roughly 1 ton). What amazes me is the amount of actual corn still attached. Mostly immature ears, but a fair few mature ones. Our bulls love it and do very well.

Regards

I was thinking about the corncobs. Same protien as rice straw. Could it be mixed with urea and molassas, same as the fang mak, and ensiled 15 days?

I've thought about that before and the left overs from the maize crop (just the dried bit thats left), not sure you can ensile it though. I had pretty good sucsess with Fang Mak, for a while but at 50 bhat a bail it would not be worth it (is that for rice straw !!!!?). I think I'll open a new thread on "food" and we'll try and keep this one for "sources"

An other one D-aggro based up north Pinapple, maize and bagas silage, I've aent them an e-mail for prices

D-AGRO

Fish meal siamproteins

.I need soyabean meal

regards

Try Thai Vegetable Oil - Thailand's biggest (and perhaps only?) soybean crusher. After they crush the soybeans to get the oil they are left with soybean meal. See http://www.tvothai.com/ and click on feed meal.

I think you can also buy individual feed ingredients like soybean meal and fish meal, etc, etc, from Cargill - they have feed mills in different parts of the country and are biggest agribusiness company in the world trading all sorts of commodities between different countries.

Good luck.