This spread sheet is made freely available as share ware and can be widely distributed as long as all three sheets are copied and they are not altered from their original state. Given the open nature of spread sheets it is possible to alter and change the data and equations in this spread sheet. Please do not do this. Because of this risk A T Chamberlain can make no assurances or warranties as to this spreadsheet or its output. I think that the spreadsheet is useful in its original format.

Dairy cow rationing is a clinical subject; it must be done in conjunction with on farm assessments and detailed examination and assessment of the animals, feeds and management system. Workers should always make an effort to assess the ration on farm and make clinical judgments before they use more sophisticated software to assess the ration in detail. Such on farm assessment can be done manually using data from the RUMNUT crib sheet. This simple Excel spreadsheet automates the procedure and uses slightly better equations. I wrote it to run on my Palm palmtop so that I could use it on-farm. It may also be useful on some laptops.

 

Instructions

The spreadsheet is designed to be small and quick rather than slick so it is a little clunky in places Only put data in the yellow cells; use the DMI corr to take into account feed presentation etc; stage of calving, body weight and milk yield are already accounted for.

Enter the ration on the second 'Feeds' sheet.

Enter the fresh weight intake per cow per day in the second column. Make sure any feeds used in previous rations are set to zero. Check the total at the end to make sure it looks logical. You can alter the analyses of the grasses, silages and cakes in the yellow boxes. Once the feeds are all entered trigger the spread sheet to re-calculate if necessary. The results are on the 'Reqs' sheet.

The animals requirements for DMI, ME, CP and the major minerals are calculated and compared to what the ration supplies. The balance is expressed as a percentage with 100% being perfectly balanced.

The NDF (fibre), sugars, starch and fat content are compared to the recommended limits Ignore every thing to the right of the 'Balance%' column as these are back ground calculations

Good luck and I hope it is useful!