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Rio Nutrition lick tubs

A

Amo

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Joined
Dec 19, 2014
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117
Location
Chambers NE
Well, Im contemplating various winter supplement options. Ive visited over the phone with the Rio Nutrition folks in the past. Im curious as to anyones use/experiences in using the said product. Ive visited with them in the past. About the only way to shut them up is to hang up! :lol: Beyond that, its a 19% protein tub. Not sure about energy levels. They have their "fairy dust" product nutrisorbe which is supposedly a mixture of amafirm, bio mos, and other various fairy dust products which supposedly some people like to claim maybe bumps it up to maybe a 24....notice all the maybes the salesman put in that statement! I don't mean to bash feed companies various types of products. To an extent, I think they do what they claim....but ya know what I mean. Its not protein or energy....its "fairy dust". Plus chelated mineral with other "high powered minerals", so on and so forth. Sales guy never stopped! Guaranteed consumption of 1/3# @ $0.38 a day.

I like the guarantee part. Curious as to how "stingy" they are about it. The bad part about any tub vs. a cube/alfalfa is intake. Say the tub is 19% protein. We will say alfalfa is 19%. If I feed alfalfa I can feed say 10#s. Using said tub your maybe feeding 1/3 to 1.5# if its really bad. Which maybe a person doesn't need to feed 10#s of 19% protein. But its something to think about. Of course the sales guy at Rio says you don't need that much protein cause the nutrisorbe "pulls more goodie out of the hay". Ok, is he saying it turns the current protein into bypass protein? Kinda doubt it. Unless the hay is put up wet, causing heat damage isn't all the protein available? I understand breaking down the forage, but feeding protein will do that. So I somewhat question the validity of their fairy dust. Plus it has mineral, so you don't have to feed loose mineral if your using this product. Now you only have so much physical room to meet protein and mineral needs in 1/3 of a pound....its a little bit hard to put my mind around it being possible. Plus the price. Very rough math, he said 2 ton would last me (175 cows) 69 days. So going off the $0.38 a day quote .38 X 69 days 175 cows is $4588.5. Or $2300 a ton. Which cost per head per day is less than my Crystalyx tub. Its a 30%, 250# protein tub for $93 I think. Which at 3/4# consumption is .28 cents a day, but mineral on top of that. They'd be getting more protein than a the Rio tub, but the Crystalyx does contain urea....interpret that as you will. So, in my case the Rio tubs are not very competitive. Feed store has a pretty good price on them though. Semi loads. Hard to believe the difference in consumption would make that big of price swing. Did the math several times. Just Rio advertises a lot. Just curious as to first hand experiences. Curious if its worth all its cracked up to be.

My other options are of course is alfalfa, cubes, etc. They are in the mix to be considered. Just curious as to feed back on Rio tubs.
 
I have no idea about Rio Tubs, but if it sounds too good to be true.....it probably is.

Mineral does not stay disbursed in lick tubs. The ones we sell we recommend free choice mineral be fed along with it, so I think
the Rio salesmen is.....selling... :D . When mineral is heated it loses some of it's nutrition. Which brings me to ask, is the Rio tub a cooked tub or a chemical tub?

I have a crude protein comparison chart that I saved from years back. They compared alfalfa hay to other protein sources.
Alfalfa hay at $100/ton was by far the cheapest source of protein. Plus you get some dry matter with it and we are finding more and more how important DRY MATTER is in a diet.

Remember when you are figuring protein, take the moisture out. For instance you stated 10# of 19% alfalfa. Figure the moisture at 12% You now have 8.8# of dry matter x 19% = 1.67# crude protein. That's adequate depending on what stage of gestation your cattle are in. We normally feel you can feed your own home raised feedstuffs cheaper than what you can buy. Protein is fairly easy
to meet the requirements, in our country it is energy requirements that is hard to meet.

All protein isn't created equal. Soybean meal is the highest form of protein.

http://www.feedipedia.org/node/674
Soybean meal is the most important protein source used to feed farm animals. It represents two-thirds of the total world output of protein feedstuffs, including all other major oil meals and fish meal (Oil World, 2015). Its feeding value is unsurpassed by any other plant protein source and it is the standard to which other protein sources are compared (Cromwell, 1999). While it has been an accepted part of livestock and poultry diets in the United States since the mid-1930s (Lewis et al., 2001), soybean feed production took off in the mid-1970s and then accelerated in the early 1990s due to a growing demand from developing countries. The expansion of aquaculture and prohibitions on the feed use of slaughterhouse by-products have also fueled the demand for this high-quality source of protein (Steinfeld et al., 2006).

Soybean meal is the by-product of the extraction of soybean oil. Several processes exist, resulting in different products. Soybean meal is usually classified for marketing by its crude protein content or by the sum of protein + oil. There are two main categories, the "high-protein" soybean meal with 49-50% of protein + oil and 3% crude fiber, obtained from dehulled seeds, and the "low protein" meal, with 44-46% protein + oil and 6-7% crude fibre, that contain the hulls. In solvent-extracted soybean meals, oil content is typically lower than 2% while it exceeds 3% in mechanically-extracted meals

FWIW~I think you are on the right track to question what you are questioning.

Good luck.
 
I've got a lot of corn silage this year we have the cows on 40#s per head plus 25#s of hay give or take on the hay some is pretty rough. I may buy some alfalfa as it is very reasonable here this year but the cows are very loose so I doubt I'll spend money if I don't have to. I'm short on hay so this is our program cows are a bit drug down so I figure get them fat then we can back off if I feel the need. Never got much value from tubs here other than on cows in the late summer early fall seamed like the calves really swelled up that year.
 
Faster Horses, Im not exactly what a chemical tub is. Guess Ive always known them as either a cooked/molasses or a pressed tub. Im pretty sure a Rio is a cooked/molasses tub. I find it interesting that mineral looses Im presuming avialability from heat.

I should get all scientific and figure pounds of crude protein on a dry matter basis etc. I can get alfalfa fro around $90 delivered. No test on it, but looks decent. I can get ddg cube that is 30% protein & 10% fat for $275 delivered. Guessing both would have roughly 10-15% moisture, can just figure the off 2# of the cube or 4-5# of alfalfa same difference without being super scientific. Last year I needed to buy a little hay, so I went with alfalfa. Both options have about the same amount of energy. Im thinking Id get a little more out of the alfalfa just because Id be feeding more per head...about 9#'s vs. 2# if I did either every other day.
 
$90 ton alfalfa sounds good to me.

At 9#' as fed; if you take out the moisture, say 12%, you have .88 dry matter per pound x 9#=7.92 DM @ 15% protein(just to be safe)=1.18# crude protein. $90 alfalfa costs you .045 cents per lb. @ 9#=.405/cents/hd/day. Beats the heck out of 2# costing you .38 and you are going to feed the alfalfa every other day so that just cut the 40 cents in half per/hd/da. Depending on stage of gestation, you need more protein. Cheapest thing you can do is test that hay; even after you buy it if you have to. It might save you a lot of money if it is more than 15% protein. No sense flying by the seat of your pants when there are ways to measure what you are feeding and then supplement what you need to after you know what's in the hay. What else are you feeding besides the 9# of alfalfa every other day? It might be cheapest to feed 9# of alfalfa every day; but then again, we only fed hay and mineral because we didn't have access to cheap feedstuffs.

This is cowboy math, but I like alfalfa. As a supplement, it's hard to beat it. As a full feed, it's too rich. IMO.

I haven't been around DDG cubes, but I bet they are good, depending on who makes them. Be careful of the mineral you feed with DDG's as there is a lot of sulpher in DDG's that can cause problems.

FWIW, we have a customer that plays with the RIO guys, never intending to buy anything from them. They keep calling tho. :D And when he has time, he keeps talking to them. :D

Hope this helps.
 
If you were good at nutrition Im sure you could have a lot of fun with the Rio guys. I just know enough to kinda sound like I know what Im talking about. I was on cattle tour once. Vitaferm rep was on the bus sitting across the aisle. Seen some orange tubs out in the pasture. Got to visiting about Rio. He was the one that mentioned the "lack of room" to do all that they claim that they do. This is the second time I talked to them. This flyer called it a 3TT (trimester) tub. I was just curious as to the difference if any, or just a sales pitch. Always kinda felt they were a fly by night outfit. For all the advertising on here or Cattle Today's site, farm shows, mailings etc. somehow they need to be making money to pay for advertising. I put this thread up on here, Cattle Today, and Red Power. Had a comment on RP that one guys neighbor used them and liked them. Another guy tried them and was disappointed at the results for what they cost.

The rest is cool season grass hay. Red Top, Timothy, Clover. Latter in the year might be some younger Indian or Big Blue. If its put up early and right, around 8%. Which if its that, a dry cow shouldn't need more if you just needed to maintain. Well, mine usually isn't 8% and I could put a little condition on some of them.

I agree testing pays. If I was doing a TMR etc it would be beneficial to test everything. When your feeding with a bale processor or unrolling the bale the loader tractor (alfalfa, had to beat the leaves off with the processor) its a little tougher to get it without scales etc. I know I should sort the thinners and first calvers off from the average etc. You gotta figure in management too. I hear ya on the testing part.

The one thing I always like about DDG was the aspect of bypass protein. Alfalfa doesn't have that, but if you can feed more economically, I guess it all works out in the end!
 
I have used some Rio tubs in the past. I think if you can get to the cows on a regular basis there are cheaper ways to feed. I am using some OLS tubs for my cows out is the hills. Place a bunch and hope they find them and don't eat them all at once. They were 18% at half the price of Rio tubs. I used Rio mineral tubs last summer when I was shot of time and could put more out at a time than loose mineral.
Funny story, my Grandson and I were going for a ride and the Rio guy calls, My horse was screwing around and I was leading my G'son's horse. Finally get off the phone and we go for a ride.
Fast forward a month and we are going for another ride, half a mile from home I realize I forgot my phone. My G'son says"Good, now you can concentrate on your horse". Little bugger is only 5.lol
 
Big Muddy rancher said:
I have used some Rio tubs in the past. I think if you can get to the cows on a regular basis there are cheaper ways to feed. I am using some OLS tubs for my cows out is the hills. Place a bunch and hope they find them and don't eat them all at once. They were 18% at half the price of Rio tubs. I used Rio mineral tubs last summer when I was shot of time and could put more out at a time than loose mineral.
Funny story, my Grandson and I were going for a ride and the Rio guy calls, My horse was screwing around and I was leading my G'son's horse. Finally get off the phone and we go for a ride.
Fast forward a month and we are going for another ride, half a mile from home I realize I forgot my phone. My G'son says"Good, now you can concentrate on your horse". Little bugger is only 5.lol
Click to expand...

:lol2: Takes after Gramma Tam.
 

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