Lysine is one of the two limiting amino acids in a lactating cow's diet and plays a crucial role in milk production.

Feeding lysine

• Lysine is available to animal through feedstuffs.

• Blood meal is one of the more common sources of lysine in the diet.

• The rise in price of blood meal is giving producers more reason to look at rumen protected lysine products.

• Selecting alternative lysince source is not easy though as not all sources are created equal.

• Proper research and evaluation is needed to determine best source of lysine for your herd.

• Generally, producers will look at price per ton to determine the lysine source.

• However, a better thing to look at would be the cost per gram of metabolizable lysine.

• The cost per gram of mLys is deceiving if you only look at cost per ton.

• For example, if one source of lysin is 44% mLys, contains 200g per pound and cost $3.37 per pound, it figures out to be $0.017 per gram of mLys.

• Another source of lysine is 7.4% mLys, contains 34g per pound, costs $1.43 per pound. However, when you evaluate cost per gram of mLys, it turns out to be $0.031.

• With the high cost of blood meal tracking, it is definitely worth looking at alternative lysine sources.