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Show New Compound Makes Plants Tastier To Livestock By KurtGutknecht Remember the ditty about a spoonful of sugar making the medicine go down? Well, this stuff is similar, only it encourages sheep and cattle to head for unpalatable trees and shrubs, potentially doubling dou-bling or tripling the productivity of many types of rangelands. The change in grazing preferences prefer-ences is due to a harmless and inexpensive inex-pensive compound that neutralizes many of the harmful compounds produced by shrubs and trees. The resulta much more varied and productive pro-ductive smorgasbord for livestock on millions of acres of pastures and rangelands around the world, including includ-ing hundreds of thousands of acres in the Intermountain region. "We know it (the compound) works. I've seldom seen such a strong response during research. As far as I'm concerned, it's the closest thing to a 'magic bullet' as we can get," says Utah Slate University range scientist Fred Provenza, who has studied the compound for two years. The cost-pennies per day. Provenza is cooperating with researchers re-searchers in Israel who have conducted con-ducted extensive studies of the compound, polyethylene glycol (PEG). Providing supplemental PEG once a day increased birth weight of lambs and kids, and weight gain and milk yield of sheep and goats grazing Mediterranean scrub land. Similar responses have been noted in USU studies. Research is now focusing on whether livestock self-regulate their intake of the compound. If they do, it would simplify management and cut costs for producers. PEG is a nearly tasteless and odorless compound widely used in industry for hundreds of purposes, including water-soluble lubricants, food and food packaging, and oint ments. It's also relatively cheap. Researchers in Israel estimate that it would cost about three cents per day to provide adequate supplemental PEG for sheep. PEG binds tannins, the type of compounds produced by nearly 80 percent of all shrubs and trees. Many tannins cause digestive upsets. up-sets. Provenza has been studying tannins and food selection of range livestock for several years. Tannins either bind with proteins and carbohydrates, carbo-hydrates, thereby reducing the nutritional nutri-tional value of feed, or damage the lining of the digestive system. Except for the tannin content, many of the shrubs and trees are at least as nutritious as other plants eaten by livestock. Researchers add the PEG to grains or other supplements. Only small amounts of PEG Are required, re-quired, usually much less than a tenthof a pound, for livestock to change their diets. Several studies have shown that "up to a certain point, the more PEG, the more intake in-take of these shrubs increases," Provenza says. There are hundreds of thousands of acres in the Intermountain West with nutritious but unpalatable shrubs such as bitterbrush and blackbrush where PEG could spur consumption. In Africa, adding the compound to drinking water helped livestock survive a recent drought by letting them utilize otherwise unpalatable shrubs. The compound also promises to be a valuable tool in range management, man-agement, aiding in the of control woody plant species that fuel wildfires. wild-fires. Provenza says PEG is a natural and safe method. "If it's a tannin, PEG will tie it up. PEG is something some-thing that a producer with tannin-containing tannin-containing shrubs can consider using us-ing now," he says. Much remains to be learned about use of the compound, including includ-ing exactly how much PEG to offer and in what form. Amounts of PEG may also vary according to the type of rangeland, time of year, and other factors. |