We’re diving into a fascinating study that sheds light on mycotoxin management in cattle. Despite the presence of DON and Zearalenone toxins in the feed at levels deemed tolerable by many, the study yielded statistically significant improvements in production and reproduction metrics when they are controlled.
In this episode Scott Zehr and Dr. Larry Roth we will drill into the production outcomes of the study and the theory behind it.
To grasp the true impact of mycotoxins on cattle health and production, routine testing of feedstuffs is necessary. It’s critical to know what is actually going into the cow and the only way to do that is to test feedstuffs, especially the TMR! Contact us.
🎧 Listen now to set your herd up for lifelong success!
Scott
Hey, hello, everybody. Welcome to the Ruminate This Podcast with Agrarian Solutions. I am your host, Scott Zehr. And you are listening to episode number two. This is titled DTX research results, part one. And today we’re going to be talking about the production data with our guest, Dr. Larry Roth.
Dr. Roth is the Vice president of nutrition here at Agrarian Solutions. And Larry, I welcome you into the conversation today, where we’re going to be talking about the research that was conducted with DTX. Our kind of our flagship product, if you would. And Larry, if you could just kind of tell the world a little bit about yourself, who you are, where you’re at in the country.
And we’ll dive into what led us to do a research project on this particular product here at Agrarian.
Dr. Larry Roth
All right. Thank you, Scott. It’s a pleasure to be here today. As you said, my name is Larry Roth. I’m the Vice President of Nutrition, and my training is as a dairy and beef nutritionist, and I’ve spent my career in the world of probiotics and doing battle against the wild yeast, the molds, and the mycotoxins.
And so, this opportunity here with the Agrarian is a neat way to tie everything together. And so why did we conduct this research study? Well, the DTX product has been used by the dairy industry for over 25 years with some great results for improving milk production and helping cows get pregnant and stay pregnant.
But what we did not have, Scott, was good controlled research. Our evidence was based upon what had happened out in the real world. So we want to demonstrate exactly what we would do under a controlled situation with randomized cows. The type of research that could be published in a peer review journal.
So that’s what we set out to do.
Scott
Yeah. And you know, it, it when we kind of led into this, when you came on board and you and I were visiting I was aware of a, of a company founded by Mark Thomas up here in Laval, New York. Larry, you’re out in Minnesota. I’m over here in New York. So. And dairy health and management services.
So talk to us about what they do quickly and how did we end up contracting with them?
Dr. Larry Roth
All right. Dairy Health and Management Services is a group of research minded veterinarians. They also do on farm consulting from a nutrition and health management standpoint. But they’ve really made a name for themselves in conducting peer reviewed, publication worthy research.
So, different situations led to making some contact. We established what we wanted to do. Going to a very well managed herd, large herd, where cows are challenged by mycotoxins, but don’t necessarily seem to really be suffering. So, what can we do under research conditions to improve performance with mycotoxin challenged cows. And that’s what we did in this study.
Scott
So when you say challenged by mycotoxins you and I both know that that term alone as accurate as it may be, right? Cause cows are challenged by mycotoxins. There is a varying degree within the industry, of opinions as to what challenge means as far as a level of toxins.
So talk to us about what would you say the challenge was on the farm from a testing standpoint and also you know, where, where there, what toxins were present.
Dr. Larry Roth
Okay. So very well managed. Herd production for control cows, as we’ll see here in a little bit, averaged about 115 pounds a day for the first 150 days in milk.
So cows are doing pretty decent. Pretty good reproduction on these cows that, but they didn’t have digestive issues. Feed intake wasn’t jumping around. Things just looks good with these cows. But Don was present at 1.5 parts per million, and Zearalenone at approximately 150 parts per billion. So most of those would be kind of in that moderate to a little bit high category, especially the Don.
But let’s see what, what would happen when we provided some protection. Because if we provide some protection and we see improvements in production and repro, then that means that there was a mycotoxin challenge on the cows.
Scott
So the study itself, can you dive in a little bit with the audience?
How is it designed? What was it designed to look at? And let’s go from there.
Dr. Larry Roth
Alright, so this was a 3600 cow dairy. Commercial dairy, some real good genetics, but they experience with conducting feeding trials. So this study was conducted from late August of 22 to late May of 23. So there wasn’t heat stress as one of the factors, but again, the challenge was mycotoxins.
Again, Just to repeat for everybody, a little bit over 1.5 parts per million of Don, approximately 150 parts per million of zearalenone, and that was determined by sampling the TMR every two weeks. So our objective was to evaluate daily milk production for the 150, first 150 days of milk, and then also evaluate pregnancy per service at the first preg check.
And then also come back at the second preg check. So, do we get cows pregnant, and do they stay pregnant as well? So we used approximately 460 cows into each the control treatment, and the group that got the DTX concentrate. It was about a third. First lactation and two thirds second and greater lactation cows.
So when cows came into the dry pen they were randomly assigned based upon lactation number and expected calving date into either the control or the DTX group. Now, even though the assignment took place when they came to the dry pan, we did not start feeding DTX until the cows freshened. But the early assignment let us have cows assigned so that as soon as they freshened, the personnel at the dairy knew exactly which group they were going to go into.
Cows were fed one time a day. And kept track of feed deliveries and feed waybacks cows from milk three times a day using the AFI milk system to record milk production from first hundred and fifty days. Also recorded at the pin level milk components fat, protein and solid solid fat as well as somatic cell count and then dairy comp 305 was used for measuring services per conception. These cows were all synchronized for first service at plus or minus 73 days in milk.
What was kind of interesting Scott about this dairy is that 90 percent of the first lactation cows received an embryo at the first service. And 99 percent of the second and third lactation received an embryo. Those first lactation cows that did not receive an embryo were bred to sex hosting semen. And all of the other cows, second, third, and higher, received conventional beef semen. If they didn’t receive an, an embryo.
So, so really it’s a pretty different.
Scott
Yeah, it’s, I mean, it’s a, it’s a pretty aggressive reproduction strategy which there’s a lot of herds in the country, right. Using beef, semen and sex semen or sorted semen. This herd, right. Using more embryos. So that’s pretty unique. And we can get, you know, we’ll get into some of the repro stuff on episode well, two part two where we talk about the reproduction.
So, you know, we have a study that was designed to look at production and reproduction. So Larry, let’s dive into, did we sort cows by lactation? Is that how we did it? You know, tell us a little bit about that and then we can dive into what actually happened.
Dr. Larry Roth
You bet. So, when cows freshen, first lactation went off to a pen by themselves, so the control had a first lactation pen, as did the DTX group.
But second and greater, they went to one of two pens for the control, and then one of two pens for the DTX. So, for the first hundred days lactation, there were three pens for control cows, and three pens for DTX. And then on day 101, or approximately day 101, all of the control cows went to a common pen and all of the DTX cows went to a common pen.
So a total of eight pens involved in the whole study.
Scott
You mentioned there was 460 cows in each group, 920 cows total. That’s a pretty sizable study. I mean, is there anything else in the way of mycotoxin research done on farm with this kind of numbers?
Dr. Larry Roth
Scott, I don’t think there’s anything near this scope that has been conducted with mycotoxin protection products.
There have been some small studies, you know, on the aflatoxin, where, you know, they feed something, see if aflatoxin disappears from the milk. But nothing has been n this size and scale from a mycotoxin protection standpoint.
Scott
Okay. So that kind of sets itself. Yeah. Yeah. That’s really interesting.
Talk about data. So, you know, let’s dive into, you know, what actually happened. What were some of the outcomes and we can start with the first lactation animals control versus treatment. How did we fare? What did we find out?
Dr. Larry Roth
Okay. Well, that’s kind of interesting, Scott. So, first lactation cows for the first 150 days, we did not pick up a statistical difference.
The cows average 82 pounds a day, but not a statistical difference. When we move over to second and greater, lactation. Then we had an improvement. Like I said, it was 115 pounds approximately for the control. And the DTX cows averaged two and a half pounds more a day for the first 150 days. And that was a P value of 0.0001. So a very strong difference.
Scott
That’s very good. Why do you think the first lactation animals didn’t see a response in milk production?
Dr. Larry Roth
Well, that’s, that’s interesting because we know that they did show a response to the DTX, but that comes in our next episode where we talk about repro. So, we did something. Now, what would have been interesting was to have weighed cows or at least body taped them to see, did these cows, put their extra nutrients into growth rather than into…
Scott
Interesting.
Dr. Larry Roth
Yeah. The other thing Scott to remember on this study is we did not feed the DTX concentrate during the dry period. And quite often we think that we need about seven to 10 days to really notice the DTX benefits. So if we start feeding DTX on the day that the cow freshens, maybe we missed those first critical days. Because as we’ll see in our next episode, we did improve reproductive performance with first lactation cows.
Scott
We did. And I’m going to drop a teaser that that we’re going to talk about. And Larry, we significantly impacted reproduction results. And, and so we will dive in that in episode two. So, okay.
So, and, and also we didn’t track these first lactation animals further into their, you know, after they dried or had finished her lactation, went dry. So we don’t know what they’re doing now in their second lactation. It would be interesting to, to know if, you know, we did something to help with a sophomore slump, that kind of thing.
But as I’ve heard you say many a times the perfect study has never been done.
Dr. Larry Roth
That’s right. Yep.
Scott
So onto the second lactation and greater cows. So we talked about, you mentioned two and a half pounds of milk increase. So, for the study, if we didn’t see a direct milk response in the first lactation cows.
You would hypothetically say that we fed those cows, DTX, but we didn’t see a response in milk. Maybe like, should we have fed them? We can talk about the product or the reproduction research in the next episode and, and so we can make that, that correlation there. But from a milk perspective, you know, we, we had the gain in the, in the mature cows.
So what was the final outcome from say like a return on investment standpoint? Was it worth feeding the product if we didn’t get a milk response out of the first lactation cows?
Dr. Larry Roth
Okay. Well, the answer to your question, Scott, is no. Because you’ve had it and you didn’t see our improvement there. But again, that’s a teaser for the next session, where we’ll talk about reproductive improvement.
Scott
Well, and so, you know, if I, if I’m understanding the research correctly, right, we did get a Two and a half pound increase. And so the for second…
Dr. Larry Roth
We showed a greater lactation, we did.
Scott
And we showed a three and a half to one return on investment. Did that three and a half to one return on investment include the cost of feeding the first lactation animals?
Dr. Larry Roth
No, it did not. Okay. We just did that on the second and greater.
Scott
Second and greater. Okay. Very good. So Larry, if we could go back to the mycotoxin challenge. So, we were roughly a 1500 parts per billion, or 1.5 part per million average of, of Don, vomitoxin. Is that, is that a high level? Is that a, how do we consider that? Is that a low risk, high risk, medium risk?
Dr. Larry Roth
That’s a very, very interesting question. And, typically, here at Agrarian, we say that one part per million or a thousand part per billion is kind of the start of the high risk area. Other people will say it’s someplace higher. Well, I guess I’m going to come back and say, do we really want to evaluate it just on the level of mycotoxin that’s there?
Or do we want to go with what the cows are telling us? If the cows are showing signs that reproduction isn’t what it should be, we’re seeing loose manure, we’re seeing cows are jumping around on feed intake, that tells us that issues are, are, are there. Or we could say we bring in, a form of mycotoxin protection, and do we see a response?
This would tell us, this study would tell us that at 1.5 parts per million, the second and greater lactation cows were challenged by the Don and Zearalenone. Because when we fed DTX, we saw improvement in milk production.
Scott
So with this study Don levels, and we’re going to also talk about there was other toxins in the, in the feed.
You already mentioned that. So we, we also had zearalenone, which we do think of as affecting repro maybe more directly than say, than Don. But we would also think of, you know, any mycotoxin if it’s causing inflammation is also going to indirectly affect other parts of the body, other you know, say milk production.
Right. And the, the 145 part per billion levels of zearalenone average, is that considered high? Like, where, where are we at with that?
Dr. Larry Roth
Okay. That level of zodol we would consider medium. However, we should consider the mycotoxins together. You have a cumulative effect. So that, that, that’s where I don’t really like to put mycotoxins by themselves into a low, medium, or high category, because you really need to look at what the cumulative effect is.
So here you had Don level that we would normally put into the high risk and zearalenone in the medium risk. So you put the two of them together and they have a cumulative effect that I would say these cows were at a high risk level.
Now, again, if you look at the cows, they were an excellent body condition. They didn’t look like they were suffering. Second and greater, we improved milk production. So I would contend that those cows did have a mycotoxin challenge on them.
Scott
Right. And, you know, just to be clear, so we, it kind of, for the audience, what was our level of involvement at Agrarian with this study?
Like how did we have a, like, did we have a part in this? I mean, I know the answer, but I just want to hear it from you.
Dr. Larry Roth
You bet. So Dairy Health and Management Services were contracted to do the study. They were in charge of organizing, assigning the cows, doing the statistics, the site visits, the whole bit.
At Agrarian, we were not involved in conducting the study. I did not make a visit to the dairy until two weeks before the end of the, of the study. Yeah. So. Yeah, we funded the study, but it was completely conducted by Dairy Health and Management Services. So a third party study.
Scott
I think to that point of when we visited the farm, you and I went there together with another colleague.
And this was a herd that I had in, in my previous career had been to. Larry there, you couldn’t find anything out of place. You know, you mentioned it already. It was a well managed herd and they didn’t clean up just because we were coming either. They have their stuff together.
So that was, that was good.
Dr. Larry Roth
I think another key comment to make Scott is that the study was conducted on a blind basis. What does that mean?
Scott
Yeah, tell us about that.
Dr. Larry Roth
Yeah, the only people who really knew which supplement was which was the folks at the feed mill who made the supplement, two supplements were delivered to the farm, a supplement A and a supplement B.
And then the Dairy Health and Management Services representative that was the onsite monitor knew which was which. So the people at the dairy. They knew that supplement A went to these pens, supplement B went to the other pens. But they had no idea which was the control supplement and which was the test supplement.
So I think that’s important because, Scott, not every dairy is set up to do research studies, and this is a dairy that was experienced with conducting feed additive type trials.
Scott
And just just to be clear, and I know, you know, that the people listening to this might know, some of them may not.
When you talk about the supplements, you know, we, we, some, some people may think of supplement as ARDTX as a supplement in the feed. You’re talking about the, the two different say mineral mixes or protein mixes that were delivered to the farm. And yeah, just one had DTX, one didn’t. Right. No, nobody knew which one was which other than Daryl.
Dr. Larry Scott
Correct. Yeah, correct.
Scott
Well, Larry, you know, I appreciate you joining in here to talk about the DTX research on the production side. And if, if you hit subscribe to the podcast here we’re going to be dropping episodes the first, third and fifth Monday of every month, and we look forward to further conversations along the lines of mycotoxins and how they affect our cattle. So Dr. Larry Roth, thank you again for joining us. And we’ll, we’ll talk again soon.
Dr. Larry Roth
All right. Thank you, Scott.
Scott
Thanks.
