This episode was recorded at the 2025 Western Dairy Management Conference in Reno, Nevada. Dr. Lock begins with an overview of his presentation, discussing nutrition and genomics impacts on the speed of progress in milk fat production. He also talks about historic differences in milk fat production in Europe compared to the US. With the reduction in generation interval that genomics provides, a more complete understanding of rumen and mammary metabolism will continue to be imperative. How do we supply the nutrients she needs to meet her genetic potential? (3:34)
This episode was recorded at the 2025 Western Dairy Management Conference in Reno, Nevada.
Dr. Lock begins with an overview of his presentation, discussing nutrition and genomics impacts on the speed of progress in milk fat production. He also talks about historic differences in milk fat production in Europe compared to the US. With the reduction in generation interval that genomics provides, a more complete understanding of rumen and mammary metabolism will continue to be imperative. How do we supply the nutrients she needs to meet her genetic potential? (3:34)
Can we feed too much 16:0? The panel discusses how palmitic and other fatty acids are incorporated into milk fat. They emphasize that no matter what, milk fat will remain a liquid at body temperature, so that does provide some limitations. Processors can alter their protocols to account for increased palmitic acid in milk fat and for increased milk fat in milk overall. (8:35)
There is a gene called DGAT that can explain about 50% of the variation in milk fat content. Dr. Lock discusses some research looking at more vs less favorable DGAT profiles and how feeding palmitic acid interacted with those profiles in milk fat production. (13:04)
The panel discusses whether there is a physiological limit for how much milk fat a cow can produce. Traditionally, when milk yield increased, fat yield decreased, but that is not the current case. We are learning more all the time about altering rations and using new oilseed ingredients like whole cottonseed and high-oleic soybeans. Dr. De Souza emphasizes that understanding de novo fatty acid synthesis is really important to keep pace with genomic progress. (16:08)
Amino acid supplementation has recently been linked with milk fat production, with the assumed mechanism of action being increased mammary gland enzyme synthesis and activity. Dr. Lock describes a study assessing amino acid-fatty acid interactions in fresh cows. The amino acid (metabolizable protein) effect was greater for fat yield than feeding fatty acids, which was interesting. But perhaps more exciting was the effects were additive. Feeding both high metabolizable protein and 2% palmitic:oleic acid blend resulted in 9.5 kg more energy-corrected milk and a carryover effect after supplementation ceased. (22:41)
Dr. Lock summarizes some of his group’s work on using oilseeds in dairy diets.(28:24)
Dr. De Souza and Dr. Lock give some perspective on just how much we have learned about milk components over the last several years. (34:38)
Panelists share their take-home thoughts, including practical advice on increasing milk fat production and what’s on the horizon for fatty acid nutrition research. (37:15)
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Scott Sorrell (00:07):
Good evening everyone, and welcome to the Real Science Exchange, the pubcast where leading scientists and industry professionals meet over a few drinks to discuss the latest ideas and trends in animal nutrition. We've got back with us one of our, our popular guests Dr. Adam Lock from Michigan State University. Welcome. Thank you. Adam is giving a talk here at the Western Dairy Management Conference, and it is called Feeding for Milk Fat. How can we continue to increase milk fat yields? So, I'm gonna be interested, we're, we're pretty high as it is come a long way, and evidently we're going to raise 'em even higher. So looking forward to hearing more about that. Before I get into this though, I'd like to introduce my co-host, Dr. Clay Zimmerman. Welcome. Yep. Thanks, Scott Sorrell. I see you finished your milk since the last one I did, yeah. Yeah,
Dr. Jonas De Souza (01:11):
Oh, thanks for having me.
Scott Sorrell (01:12):
Now I understand you've got a connection with Adam. You wanna tell us a little bit about that? Yeah,
Dr. Jonas De Souza (01:16):
Well, yes. So
Scott Sorrell (01:53):
Yeah. Yeah. Good stuff.
Dr. Jonas De Souza (01:54):
For 10 years. Yeah.
Scott Sorrell (01:55):
Yeah. Good stuff. Yeah,
Dr. Adam Lock (01:57):
I would say so Jonas is an offer on, on this and on many of our stuff. So it's been a, it's been a fun time going from a student Yeah. Mentor
Scott Sorrell (02:06):
To
Dr. Adam Lock (02:06):
A collaborator to a good friends collaborators kind of side. So we do a lot of work together and think through a lot of these things together. So,
Scott Sorrell (02:13):
Yeah. Awesome story. Yeah. Good. So, Adam, tell us a little bit about yourself. Okay. Kinda some of the research you're doing these days, and then give us kind of a real brief overview of the, the presentation you gave today.
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Dr. Adam Lock (03:34):
Yeah. So I'm originally from England, from a dairy farm, small dairy farm in the southwest of England. I been at Michigan State now since 2009. I have a research extension appointment even since I started my PhD. It's all been fatty acid based. I've kind of gone into different areas, but it's all lipid based. So my, my whole program is lipid, under a lipid umbrella, but you know. And did you
Scott Sorrell (03:56):
Study lipids prior to coming to Michigan State? Yes.
Dr. Adam Lock (03:58):
Yes. Okay. Yeah, so my PhD was in conjugated linoleic acids in cows. Okay. That's how I got to meet Dr. Bauman, which got it brought me over here. So it's all related there. But you know, so we did a lot of milk fat depression, and now we're doing the opposite, you know? Yeah. How to promote it more. And we've been looking at different technologies and things. So the talk today, I think they, the organizers wanted me to sort of talk about where can we go and how can we sustain this rapid growth in, in milk components, particularly milk fat yields. Yeah. you know, when I first came over here, people see were quite happy with a free five butter fat. Right. And I'd never seen one that low before I came
Scott Sorrell (04:33):
Here. Right. I know Exactly. Coming from Europe. Right.
Dr. Adam Lock (04:35):
Dr. Adam Lock (05:15):
And then at the end, I get the, I just showed the one example of, you know, you often hear people say, well, we must be at the limit of production. So I found the, what I think looked like one of the highest record producing cows right now. And she was at eight, 8.6 pounds of milk fat a day. So we have, we have a lot of more opportunity. Right. Yeah. And then we'll probably talk about this more in a minute. The big, one of the big aspects of this is since 2009, 2010, with genomic testing. Yeah. We, I think it's like six times faster, rapid growth in selection for, and we're selecting more for milk fat and milk protein now as well.
Scott Sorrell (05:48):
So, yeah. And that, that's gotta be a big part of it. Right.
Dr. Adam Lock (05:50):
A big part. Yeah. It's not one, you know, sometimes you hear it's all genetics or it's all nutri. It's
Scott Sorrell (05:54):
Both. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Right. You know? So, so circling back to kind of, you know, the, the comments you made about the fact that you'd never seen milk fat that low. Yeah. What was the difference between what they were doing in Europe and what we were doing in the States? Do you have a feel for that?
Dr. Adam Lock (06:07):
Well, part of it was the higher milk productions probably here to some extent. Okay. Some dilution. Yeah. But higher starch diets here, probably, you know, less grass silage diets in most parts of the country here. A lot of byproduct feeding here. Mm-Hmm
Scott Sorrell (06:55):
Yeah. Yeah. No, no. Interesting. so I guess my next question would be, so a lot of this is genomics. It's, it's, it's taken off. How well are we learning to be able to feed the animals to meet the, the her genetic potential? Yeah. Are we catching up? We still got a ways to
Dr. Adam Lock (07:12):
Go. So that, that was the question I, I, I posed. I, how can we keep up with the geno with the genetics? Yeah. I think we're doing a good job. Yeah.
Scott Sorrell (07:21):
Okay.
Dr. Adam Lock (07:21):
I think we are. What has to happen going forward, assuming that genomics is gonna carry on at that rapid rate, you know, with that, you know, it is really that reduction of intervals, the generation intervals, you know, they're, you know, instead of, what, five or six years? 10 years? It's a couple years now. Right. So that, that's a big part of it. I think what we need to do going forward is better understand ru metabolism. Yeah. You know, how the mammary gland works, and then it's identifying the key nutrients to supply that she does can't make it out. Nothing. Right. Yeah. So and then, which, you know, there's two places, ma the milk mam, there's two ways the mam gland makes milk fat. You know, she breaks it from acetate and butyrate, the de novo fatty acids, and she makes preform fatty acids. Mm-Hmm
Scott Sorrell (08:31):
So, yeah. So can we feed too much? 16, zero?
Dr. Adam Lock (08:35):
Well, that's an interesting question. Right. It's what we don't have a good handle on that right now. And it's probably the same in other aspects of nutrition. We don't, I can't say, oh, you need x grams of tic acid to make this much milk fat. Mm-Hmm
Dr. Adam Lock (09:30):
Okay. So that's kind of where that, that whole butter gate issue kind of got lost in the, well, the mam glands is always making a li a milk milk fat that's liquid at body temperature. Yeah. Has to, and, and it, so that's very specific where those fatty acids go, for example, butyrate, all of it goes on the, on the third position.
Scott Sorrell (09:48):
Okay. Right.
Dr. Adam Lock (09:49):
Palmitic probably initiates it. And that's why one of the reasons in the work Jonas and I and others have done is why TIC helps promote more milk fat. It initiates more triglyceride production, and then she puts the other fatty acids around it mm-hmm
Scott Sorrell (10:17):
And then weren't we getting some pushback from processors in terms of having too much 16 zero in the final product?
Dr. Adam Lock (10:25):
Yeah. That's, that's been interesting in Europe and here around hardness of, of, of milk fat. Again, it's not a big shift because she's making a liquid milk fat body temperature. Right. But there are some su subtle differences there, and some people have been reporting on those. But it's, I don't think it has a huge impact. And, you know, some of that you can over, from what I've been told, you can overcome some of those minor differences quite easily in how you manufacture, you know, in terms of churning rate of butter and different things. So
Dr. Jonas De Souza (10:57):
You can change processing to adjust that. Yeah. I think there is a lot of that. I can, yeah.
Dr. Adam Lock (11:03):
You recently did a study with different fatty acid supplements and, and butter fat, didn't you?
Dr. Jonas De Souza (11:08):
Yeah. Yeah. We did Ohio State. 'cause That was exactly the question. So we varied the fatty acid profile, and I think the simple answer is like, PME is better used, the efficiency visualization is greater, so you're gonna find more milk fat, so it's gonna influence your, your end product. So, but not to a point that is more a subtle difference. Right. This is statistical difference, but but you know, then we work with the food side there and, you know, there is things you can do to overcome that. Like they talk about I think yesterday they mentioned here the, the, the amount of total fat that you have on the butter, you know, you can change that. You can change the properties, you can change the amount of air that you incorporate on the butter. So, so if that definitely that is an issue or start being an issue in the industry that is process that we can you know, overcome these maybe two or three, four units greater icic acid in
Dr. Adam Lock (12:07):
It may also be opportunity for certain Yeah. Food products. Right, right. You know, differences there. But, you know, until we do a lot more segregation of milks, it's almost somewhat new
Dr. Jonas De Souza (12:18):
Point, I think. Yeah. When, when the butter gates started, I think we went back and looked at these, and the problem that is not really good data for us to compare these, but if you go to older studies and newer studies and you start looking the month of IC acid in the milk fat, and, you know, take to consideration that you may have methods that vary on determine those fatty acids and other factors, but it seems that palm acid has increased in milk, you know, in the last 30 years. And we're talking about genetics, right? So if we select for milk fat, that is a great genetic correlation that we are selecting for certain fatty acids as well. So I think we select for higher IC acid in the milk. We just didn't realize then. Yeah.
Dr. Adam Lock (13:04):
That is the interesting part of what Jonas is talking there with the genetics part, is I, one of the data sets I showed is that Jose's worked with Rob Templeman because of the feed deficiency program at MSU, all our cows have been genomically tested. So we were able to identify those cows. There's one gene called DGA that can explain about 50% of variation in milk fat content. Okay. It's the, it's the enzyme that puts the last, the third fatty acid on a glycerol backbone. And so we were able to go back through our data and identify, I think all 350 cows, like a thousand observations of cows with the different, you know, genotypes for that. And it, it, it was right that those cows that had like the the better genotype is one for another word versus the lower had more milk fat. But what was interesting, the palmitic acid response was similar in both, but with the low dga genotype, the palmitic acid brought fat yields in those cows up to the, where the non-par acids were here, but then palmitic acid went on again. So there's a lot of that nutrition, genomics time of interactions here. And I think it's, that's good. You know, one of the reasons why milk fat's going up so much now is we're, we're selecting for that. You know, and we're putting so much more weight on, on milk fat as well. So,
Clay Zimmerman (14:22):
So, so Adam, I, I actually did milk fat depression work mm-hmm
Dr. Adam Lock (14:31):
Still in shorts then.
Dr. Jonas De Souza (14:32):
Yeah.
Clay Zimmerman (14:33):
And we we induced it by feeding really low fiber diets. Yeah. Very low fiber diets. But I noticed back then there were some cows we could never depress their milk fat percentage. Yeah.
Dr. Adam Lock (14:47):
That, that is fascinating. Right? I mean, in, in my mind, probably RU pH is a bigger impact on milk fat was a bigger impact on milk fat depression than how much unsaturated fat was in the diet. They, they're both important, but the RU pH was more one of the most, and and related to your last question, a group in Wisconsin a number of years ago now, they had some cannulated cows that had different milk fats or, and had totally different rumen populations. They did a complete em swap of their rumen contents. Within about a couple weeks they'd returned back to where they were. Yeah. You know, so there's the genetics in cows there maybe related to eat feeding behavior, saliva production, you know, ruminations that probably impact all of that. Right. And why you couldn't induce milk fat depression in some of them. Right. Yeah. It's interesting.
Clay Zimmerman (15:37):
So we've obviously seen very dramatic increases in milk fat percentage in the US dairy herd. It really, I mean, last year it really accelerated. So do you think there's, is there a physiological limit to how high fat percent can go in these cows? Fat yields a whole different question. Right. But yeah.
Dr. Adam Lock (16:04):
So I kind of remember,
Dr. Adam Lock (16:08):
Yes, there's gonna be physiological limits, right? We are nowhere near them yet, I don't think. I always remember Dr. Bama said to me something once, you know, the mammary gland doesn't make components in as a percentage. It's making grams amounts of fat and protein, the percentage, just the outcome of how much fluid is she made and how much yield of these others she's made. So that, and that's why I always pretty much focus on yield responses. Okay. But the, what's happened lately, and I think I used a hordes article from Chad Deco to talk about that earlier on, you know, historically if milk yield went up, fat content went down, you know, as a, as a opposed, you are making more milk fat. But it went down the last 10 years with the, with the rapid rise milk fat content's been going up even more than milk yield. So, you know, we're getting a, a double benefit there. So it's kind of broken that correlation between the two. So, you know, the often question is can we get Holsteins milking like jerseys? Right? Right. I mean, J Holsteins nearly have always made more milk fat than jerseys, but not on a content basis. Right. But yeah, I I, we, I mean, I I hear stories of cows over five now, or herds over five. Right, right. You, you travel the industry a lot more. I mean like 4, 5, 4, 6 seems fairly common now, right?
Dr. Jonas De Souza (17:26):
Yeah. Yeah. And five is not uncommon, you know, so for, for hostings and,
Dr. Adam Lock (17:32):
But you know, I could see us being up at six at some point with how things are going. Right. But you know, may maybe then it's gonna be harder and harder to keep up with some of that. Right. But you know, we're learning more all the time. There's, there's newer opportunities coming out all the time now in terms of nutrition opportunities, you know, we've you know, we've been playing around a lot with different fatty acids, you know, and we, we, Jonas and I kind of target in on different ratios of palmitic and oleic acid for specific benefits, maybe at different times of lactation. You know, I think that feeding the cow at certain like times of production and lactation is gonna be more and more important going forward. Probably. you know, we reevaluating oil seeds, you know, which kind of went out of vogue somewhat to some extent.
Dr. Adam Lock (18:25):
And I, I think there's a lot of opportunities around whole cotton seed, high oleic soybeans. Now the one example I did gave, we did a couple of examples, like, you know, even a cow producing five pounds of milk, milk fat, sorry, you know, how many, you know, hundreds and hundreds of grams of preformed fatty acids she has to absorb to get there is, is is a lot. So imagine going higher than that. You know, we're probably gonna be feeding more higher fatty acid diets, intake's gonna go up. Right. So, but we probably have higher fat diets. Right? I mean, I, in general, I think we feed two low fat diets now, and I think that's a hangover from, you know, depression. The one way we could try and avoid milk fat depression was pulling out as much fat as possible. Right? Right. Right. So now I think we need to sort of, kind of come back the other way with that.
Dr. Jonas De Souza (19:16):
I really like one figure that we put together that from, from like looking to the contributions of, of milk fatty acids, right? And, and we have data there from, from, from Michigan, from cows producing maybe let's say up to over three kilograms. So we're talking six and a half pounds of fat, you know. And what was most interesting, and we still have to dig to understand this, is like when you look to what are the fatty acids that contribute to this increase, right? And these slopes are different as the production level increase, it seems that the contribution is coming more from mix, you know, like your icic acids denovo or provide on diet in your denovo fatty acids, then actually you perform, right? So they're all going up and contributing to that fraction. But I guess specifically I think the de understanding the Denovo piece is gonna be, is gonna be really important.
Dr. Jonas De Souza (20:19):
Yeah. You know, to keep, you know, with this space on genetics, I like to, to think that, so when, when the whole milk fatty acid testing starting, I think one thing that bothered me was people would say, okay, you know, look to this correlations, the de novos are really important. It doesn't seem the others were important. And I think for most of the data that we have generated is like, they are all important and they're all connected. Right? At the end of the day, the mammogram need multiple sources. And, and if you don't have, then that becomes the next limiting.
Dr. Adam Lock (20:53):
Yeah. You're not gonna go from four pounds to five pounds of milk fat as an extreme example with just preformed fatty acid or Yes. You need, and that that's
Dr. Jonas De Souza (21:03):
Right. Perme acid. Yes.
Dr. Adam Lock (21:04):
Yes. Yeah. That's kind of where you lose a little bit with that sort of bulk tank testing is it is on a content basis. Oh, so de novo goes up. Is is that good? You assume, but oh, it might be bad 'cause you lost, you lost fat yield 'cause you lost milk yield or something like that. Right? Right. So you kind of gotta be a little bit careful with how you interpret some of those things. So, but the other part that's, you know, so we've been talking a lot about the precursors, you know, acetate, butyrate, tic acid, and long chain fatty acids. So a couple other things I hit upon there was that, you know, preformed fatty acids is basically 18 carbon fatty acids. Right. So steric, oleic, linoleic linolenic. Okay. Linux is always the major fatty acid in a ruminants diet in North America 'cause of corn based diets. Right.
Scott Sorrell (21:56):
We're feeding And how many analogs of those are there in milk? A lot? Oh,
Dr. Adam Lock (22:00):
In, in milk there's a lot of isomers. Yeah. Okay. From because of bio hydrogen in the diet, you've got five fatty acids. Got it. Pretty much six, you know they're the important ones, right. But if we need more preform, we're gonna have to meet feed more 18 carbon fatty acids. But I guess my big take home point today on that was they're not all the same, you know, feeding oleic acid versus feeding steric acid that, you know, they're totally different beasts kind of thing. Right. And a lot that comes down to digestibility and some of it comes down to post absorptive metabolism. So we talked about that. Then the other part of that factory right, was maybe can we improve, can we stimulate the mammogram to make more milk fat, maybe even from the same amount of nutrients. Right. So there's a lot of interest there.
Dr. Adam Lock (22:41):
And we have around amino acids, you know we had showed some data there around you know, more essential amino acids versus certain specific amino acids. And there, there does, you know, I think that maybe that's more sort of enzyme in the mammary gland focused based, you know, and Van Amberg at Cornell's talked a lot about that as well. It could also be arum effect stimulating more de nova substrates as well. But we just finished a study with Hier who's a regular on here. Right. And just about the graduate in May here he hopes
Dr. Jonas De Souza (23:20):
That make another study.
Dr. Adam Lock (23:21):
Yeah. Yeah. He could do another study probably. But yeah, he designed the study. This study, he let, he, he had free re so we were really interested in amino acid, fatty acid interactions. So we fed a, an in fresh cows from one to 24 days in milk. We've had a, a low versus a high metabolizable protein diet. And the low is probably a more of a standard like
Dr. Jonas De Souza (23:41):
Kind of, yeah. It was not low as 2,400 grams of mp. So it was not, you know, not that we strip the diet out. Yeah. Right. So it was okay, you know. Yeah.
Dr. Adam Lock (23:49):
So it was what we call it low and high. And then we did a dose response with our six, what we, I call our 60 30 palmitic and oleic acid blend. But it was as a single calcium salt 60 palmitic 30. And we set fed it at zero one and 2%. So no one's done that in a fresh count diet. Interestingly overall the protein effect was bigger for fat yield than the fat, than feeding the different fatty acids, which is super interesting. Right? Yeah. But this is what's really exciting. Those effects were additive. So when we fed the 2% PME ole and the high mp, we got the benefit of both incredible. And that was nine and a half kilos more energy corrected milk. So you know that there's a lot of milk, a lot more milk fat. There was fluid and there was more milk protein as well. So I think there's a lot around that. And of course there's always a lot of interest now around, you know, maybe programming in that early lactation. We did see continue of carryover effects after that. So
Clay Zimmerman (24:50):
Was the, was amino acid profile of the low MP and high MP diets, was it similar?
Dr. Jonas De Souza (24:57):
Yeah, good question. Well we target three main amino acids on the high right. It was lysine and the histamine. So those are the three. So increase, the high MP probably had about 10% more mp. So we gimme 24 to 26, 50 ish, you know. And basically we use some of the Cornell, you know, recommendations. So we went, you know, we basically balanced those three amino acids you know, using synthetics and, and, and, you know primary blood and soy protein. That's what we change. Yeah. Yeah.
Dr. Adam Lock (25:37):
But it's interesting to think on how that MP side of it could impact milk fat so much. Yeah. Right. You know, and you know, and I, you know, if you think about that factories, it, you know, if there's a, there's a robotic factory or something, you know, if you can add more robots onto the production line, you can make more. Right. So Yeah, it makes sense. I think there's, that part of it is, is good, but you also have, she also has to have enough of the substrates to make more milk fat if she's more efficient to do it. Right. Yeah. So that's why I think we get additive effects Yeah. With some of that. And, you know, that could work. I think that probably apply in peak production as well as it would in early lactation as well. Right. So
Clay Zimmerman (26:15):
How long were the cows on that study?
Dr. Adam Lock (26:18):
Three weeks or 24 days. Yeah. From direct, from carving on. Yeah. So, you know, and then the other thing, like I, I didn't see it all 'cause I'd go give my talk. Rick Grant was doing a talk today was like UNDF, you know, tying rumination, resting time, forage quality that all plays into this, right? Because the de novo piece, you know, so, you know, he actually said, he, he said they'd just done a, they looked at some data and he had a correlation between, you know, resting time and milk fat. Right. And it kind of tied also into more feed, greater feed intake. Right. And one of the best, biggest relationships we found Jonas couple years ago plotted out the effect dry matter intake on de Novos. And it was a very linear relationship. More intake, more de novo yield and content, but yield's the most important. Yeah. Yeah.
Dr. Jonas De Souza (27:09):
It was amazing to look to the day we were trying to, you know, I think Cornell also had those data showing, you know barno right. With some of the management factors and it tied really nice with intake, you know, cows, they eat more, you have probably more organic matter fermenting the room and you do have more, more substrate. Right.
Dr. Adam Lock (27:31):
And you, the, those cows resting more are ruminating more. Yes. So you're probably getting better digestibility then. So these things all kind of tie up, come into play here then. So, you know, what else can we do on the, you know, forage digestibility or non forage fiber? You know, one of the most consistent responses we've seen other than milk fat we're feeding palmitic acid is it always improves NDF digestibility. And Fernando Badill, Jeff Kins and others now have done some work sort of showing that that's probably the, tho those main fiber digesters take up tic acid rather than making it themselves. So it's more efficient. So if you've got more fiber digesters, you, I think that's, I may have not said it correctly, but roughly that, so yeah. So it's, it's kind of interesting to think all of that, but it's a fun time right now, you know, with Yeah, I was
Scott Sorrell (28:21):
Gonna say it's a lot of progress. Yeah. A lot. A lot left to learn.
Dr. Adam Lock (28:24):
Yeah. Yeah. And we, you know Alicia Bales had just finished a PhD with me. Some of her work was reevaluating oil seats. So, you know, there was a lot of work with cotton seed done in the eighties, early nineties, but not with a hundred, 110 pound cows. Right. So she did a series of dose response, one with whole cotton seed and one with high oleic soybeans that I think sort of will help bring those back into people's minds if as a cost effective opportunity. Right. And with cotton seed, you know, we were successful even up to 16% dry matter in the diet. So
Scott Sorrell (29:02):
You mentioned high oleic soybeans. You said you had a few slides in your presentation related to that. What kind of, what, what was the content there? Yes. So
Dr. Adam Lock (29:11):
That's one of the things about having a research extension position is I get a lot, get a lot of questions, but you, and you get a lot of ideas from nutritionists and producers asking things that you don't have answers for. Right. And academics hate to say, I don't know, you know, so Well my wife says, I hate to say, I dunno,
Dr. Adam Lock (30:01):
So it's great opportunity. We're very fortunate to have that. So we did, did some of those studies. And we were, we utilized roasted and ground, high oleic soybeans 'cause that's what that farmer was using at the time. So we'd done a dose response in that area. We've looked at raw versus roasted, high oleic soybeans. Anyone interested in this? I would highly recommend going down the roasted route. There's gonna be some more cost involved in that, but I think it would soon sort of pay off. We've been very successful and very consistent in bent in milk, yielded milk, fat milk protein increases that we've seen. We even went up to 24% of them in the diet you couldn't feed anymore because that took out all the protein side. But 16% was very good. 8% more recent studies we've been doing 10, 12% diet dry matter.
Dr. Adam Lock (30:47):
Because what we were learning from the industry was, you know, there's only gonna be a certain amount you have available to feed. Right. And there's a lot of interest, I think, in those areas right now that have strong, you know, dairy and soybean growing. One other thing we've been talking about is maybe the actual oil, the high oleic oil. 'cause This oil is about 80% oleic acid versus conventional soybeans are like 55% linoleic. So, and we have some really good data on effects of oleic acid as well now. So, you know, particularly if you can grow them at home or grow them locally, it's potentially a very good option as a protein and an energy fat source. So
Scott Sorrell (31:25):
And it wouldn't be if you just shipped them to, let's say, to California or is that to cost prohibitive to do that?
Dr. Adam Lock (31:30):
Well, I, I, I don't, I, I don't know the economics of that. It'd be easier to ship the oil.
Scott Sorrell (31:36):
Yeah, true. Yeah. So is there any benefit of having that oil and trained in the, the, the protein matrix at all to keep it from rumen
Dr. Adam Lock (31:44):
Upside? Bio hydrogenation? Yeah, that's a, that's an interesting question. I don't know. Yeah. So I, but you could have perhaps see that maybe within that protein roasted protein matrix there may be a slower release. Yeah. We'll find out soon. We're doing a dose response with the oil right now. Okay. Yeah. To match what we fed in the beans before. But I know that people in the industry are doing that quite successfully right now. But that's a tool, one of the benefits there. So I showed one study where we took very simple quick study we did earlier this year where we fed the same amount of palmitic and 18 carbon fatty acids in two diets. The only difference was one diet, mostly 18 carbons came from alx soybeans and the other, it came from a saturated ric acid enriched fat source. So nutrients on paper look pretty much the same. But that oleic steric difference, there's like a two and a half kilo more energy corrected milk. Okay. And we got more milk fat. Interesting thing with that. But we did that at matched fat content. What they, the beans like that I think do allow is maybe us to feed higher levels in the diet of fat, which we will need
Scott Sorrell (32:53):
Yeah.
Dr. Adam Lock (32:54):
With higher and higher fat yields. Yeah. So it's, that's an interesting one. I think we can learn more there as well about general fat fatty acid feeding as well. Yeah. So and we've done done some field stu stuff with that recently with Jonas and with Vita plus in Michigan looking at benefits of keeping palmitic acid in a diet when you've got a lot more preformed fatty acids from high oleic soybeans. And that comes down to that whole concept of you need everything to come to the party, to, to maximize efficiency there. So, yeah.
Scott Sorrell (33:29):
Makes sense. Anything else we need to cover?
Dr. Adam Lock (33:33):
I think I mentioned, but that, you know, I think that the record cow I've seen right now is eight, 8.6 pounds of fat per day over a year. Yeah. So we know cows can, biology can at least do that. You know, I remember Dr. Bauman when we talked, did, were talking more about this number of years ago now, just in general about milk yields and it applies to this. I think the, you know, the high producers of today are gonna be the average producers of the future, you know, and that's worked out over history here now. So I think this trend is probably only gonna continue while there's such a focus on fat and protein as the payment structure. Right. So,
Scott Sorrell (34:08):
So when you guys were talking about how high can you go? I, I I, I thought of water buffalo, right? Mm-Hmm
Dr. Adam Lock (34:21):
Yeah. Not as high as the sea mammals. Yeah. They, they're like, you know, over 50% fat or something like that. And, you know, so, you know, they're all mam, we're all, they're all mammals, right? So it's interesting to think about some of those differences, right?
Scott Sorrell (34:33):
So the possibility's there, right? Yeah. I mean that we could just be scratching the, the surface
Dr. Adam Lock (34:38):
And is it, you know, ultimately the selection is driving to allow the mammogram to make more milk fat mm-hmm
Dr. Jonas De Souza (34:56):
Yeah. No, I agree. But it, I think there's a lot of questions about, you know, why protein may not increase it. I think protein concentration regulation is different than fat, but I also think, you know, when we talk about the genetics versus nutrition, and you made a very good point is like, especially last year, what I think is the incentive that we are seeing on the industry as well with payment for a fat, right? So we are trying to learn and invest more on that cal four fat probably in the last two years than we have been for protein as well, right.
Dr. Adam Lock (35:29):
Yeah. And I think we've made some jumps forward the last few years of like, just thinking about fat feeding. It's kind of like where it is in the amino acid side. We talk about amino acids now, and I think more and more now we're talking about fatty acids and not just fat, fat or e for extract. And I think that's been a huge, huge plus, you know, that, that side,
Dr. Jonas De Souza (35:49):
And I think we will get to the point where, Adam, I kind of alluded to that. We, we have a project to look what we call response curves, right? Like you ask, you know, is that a limit to matic? Well, there's probably an economical limit, right? Okay. Yeah. And, and, and, and those, that's what one of the things with all the data that Adam has over 30 studies, I think with high producing cows that, that we will start, we start working to get to those recommendations on the nutrient basis.
Dr. Adam Lock (36:21):
Of course, we wouldn't have done any of those 30 or 35 studies if I hadn't been fortunate to have good grad students, right? Mm-Hmm
Scott Sorrell (36:37):
Yeah. Good deal. Yeah. Well, we kind of get ready to kind of wrap things up here. Why don't we just kind of share our thoughts with the audience and a couple key takeaways that you guys have gotten from the conversation today or from watching the presentation, and Clay, you feel like you could lead this off here.
Speaker 4 (36:53):
Tonight's last call question is brought to you by NitroShure Precision Release Nitrogen. NitroShure delivers a complete TMR for the RU microbiome helping you feed the microbes that feed your cows. To learn more about maximizing microbial protein output while reducing your carbon footprint, visit balchem.com/nitroshure.
Clay Zimmerman (37:15):
Sure. Yeah, no, it's, it's, it's really been incredible how much how much components have increased here the last few years, especially on the fat side.
Scott Sorrell (37:26):
Are we above ahead of Europe yet, or are we still behind
Dr. Adam Lock (37:30):
In terms of Yields would be up, I'm pretty
Scott Sorrell (37:32):
Sure. Yeah, for sure there. Yeah.
Clay Zimmerman (37:34):
Yeah. I, I've asked that question when I went over there. I think we, I, I, I actually wonder if the percent components are even higher. Could be
Dr. Adam Lock (37:42):
Higher.
Scott Sorrell (37:42):
Yeah. Yeah.
Clay Zimmerman (37:44):
I, I used to
Dr. Adam Lock (37:46):
There. Yeah. We could be hired. Yeah. I've lived here
Clay Zimmerman (37:48):
A long time now. Yes. Yeah. So obviously there's still, still room to grow here and a lot on the yield standpoint. So Yeah. Exciting times here and, and we continue to learn.
Scott Sorrell (38:01):
Yeah. Yeah. Continue to learn. Good. Good point, Jonas.
Dr. Jonas De Souza (38:04):
Yeah. Well, for me, I think the application I field has been, you know, incredible to, to, it's so exciting to be in the industry at this time with the background and the questions. And I think a couple things that I usually I say to people is like, if you're gonna, of course there is many ways the memory blend makes meal fat, you know, if you want to maximize or optimize milk fat, you need to be driving more than one source. So I, I see a lot of people think, oh, I'm gonna invest, you know, X amount from this supplement, and sometimes you know, you have to consider this more than weight. And optimizing other parts is, that's what we are learning, right? I think the interactions, for example, between amino and fatty acids are fantastic. You know, like, and how much we forget, you know, that side before we, you know, trying to, to, to put our money in the other side, right? So I think it's all the coordination. We're gonna keep learning, and that's what I think it's gonna, you know, we, we, we gonna keep increasing, you know, our production levels.
Scott Sorrell (39:04):
Yeah. So as you, as you're talking to, to, to nutritionists in your role with Purdue, do you get questions from them and, and, and how can I increase yeah, milk fat and, and, and what are kind of some of your basic practical advice that you give them?
Dr. Jonas De Souza (39:20):
So, good question. Yeah. So I think the last, you know, the last I'd say year, year and a half, everyone in the incentive, you know, on, on, on the payment system has helped, right? My key advice is usually are I, I think if you're talking about fat supplementation, right? What fatty acids understand you're not feeding fat, you're feeding fatty acids. So what fatty acids are you talking about? What your basal diet is already providing, you know, what are those key opportunities that you have to optimize, you know, those, those fatty acid? And don't forget the Denovo piece, right? What are other things that we can do in terms of the nutrition to tools to bring the both together? You know, like, I think that's my major advice to people is like, think about that you need a balance, and it's not these competing against these.
Dr. Jonas De Souza (40:08):
You need to try to bring your Denovo in and your performing effect together at the same time. You know? 'cause The memory gonna need both, you know, they need that, that balance. And, and there's definitely a lot to learn there. Yeah. Right? So how do we optimize the efficiency of ritualization? But those, some, some of my, you know, and we can get into details about, you know, like, you know, how you look, your decats, how you look, your amino acids, how you look, your fatty acids, your minerals, you know, think that is, you know, all sorts of details that we can go through, you know, and and, and, you know, have different conversations of where the optimal level is. So
Scott Sorrell (40:47):
Yeah, we'll do that in the next podcast. We
Dr. Jonas De Souza (40:49):
Will
Scott Sorrell (40:49):
Sounds good. Adam, any final thoughts from you? Any thoughts share?
Dr. Adam Lock (40:53):
Well, you, you guys covered that well, I think, you know, there's no magic bullet, right? Right. This has been a team effort, I think on the genetics nutritionist, you know, the producer, you know, side that it's not one or the other, right? You know, that, that every, we've needed all parts of that, right? Mm-Hmm
Dr. Adam Lock (41:38):
So as we are looking to make more milk fat, she's gonna need more tics. Maybe that's from the diet. Maybe it's from de Nova. That's another interesting research question. But you need that mixed fatty acids. We need to work, I think we, there's a lot more work that can be done around acetate, butyrate production in the room and what can we do dietary wise, management wise, to improve that side of it, right? And that one often gets forgotten, kind of as Jonas was alluding to. And as Jonas said earlier, those are the two with more and more milk fat, there're the ones that contribute a little bit more. 'cause That slope was a little bit higher. But the preformed is where we probably have a big opportunity to have impacts. And my big take home on there is 18 carbons are not, not, they're not all the same. We have, you can't, we shouldn't even talk about just 18 carbons in the diet. You need, we need to be talking about ster Ole Lake. Yeah. Okay.
Dr. Jonas De Souza (42:27):
Target levels. Yeah. Target
Dr. Adam Lock (42:29):
Levels. Target levels.
Scott Sorrell (42:30):
Yeah. Yeah. Great conversation, Adam. Appreciate it. Thank you, Adam. Always a great guest. I love it. Always entertaining. Clay, thanks for joining us. Jonas, you're getting to be a pro here, man.
Dr. Jonas De Souza (42:40):
Thank you. No, I appreciate
Scott Sorrell (42:41):
It. Yeah. Thanks for joining us again. To our audience, thank you again for coming along with us on this little journey. We hope you learned something. I hope you had some fun, and we hope to see you next time here at Real Science Exchange, where it's always happy hour and you're always among friends.
Speaker 4 (42:55):
We'd love to hear your comments or ideas for topics and guests. So please reach out via email to anh.marketing at balchem.com with any suggestions, and we'll work hard to add them to the schedule. Don't forget to leave a five star rating on your way out. You can request your Real Science Exchange t-shirt in just a few easy steps, just like or subscribe to the Real Science Exchange. And send us a screenshot along with your address and t-shirt size to an h.marketing at balchem.com. Balchem’s Real science lecture series of webinars continues with ruminant focused topics on the first Tuesday of every month. Monogastric focused topics on the second Tuesday of each month, and quarterly topics for the companion animal segment. Visit balchem.com/realscience to see the latest schedule and to register for upcoming webinars.