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Influence of a rubber-topped feedlot slat on animal performance, welfare, and economic returns
Research Lead: Christoph Wand , Ontario Ministry of Agriculture and Food
Executive Summary
The objective/purpose of this project was to assess the impact of a new rubber slat amendment
on the performance of finishing feedlot cattle raised on slatted floors in Ontario. The product was
to be assessed in a commercial operation using three turns of cattle, essentially through all
seasons of the year. The performance data was to be used to address economic factors related
to capital cost for the rubber product, specifically whether the investment is justifiable. It was
proposed this was to be done by attributing defendable values to parameters such as; lameness
rates, incidence of health problems (“pulls”), performance, feed conversion, carcass merit (value)
and assessed against the capital cost of the rubber material.
Ben Gardiner Farms Inc., a commercial feedlot located in Perth County, Ontario was the site for a
comparison of cattle finished on conventional slatted (slotted) floors compared to a rubber
amendment. Over three turns from April, 2008 to July, 2009, a total of 936 heifers were started in
4 pens. Of the 4 pens used for the trial, 2 pens had existing conventional concrete slats.
EasyFix™ slotted rubber mats were installed in the other two pens, being placed over top of the
existing concrete slats. Cattle were tracked for various classical performance measures, animal
health, cleanliness and carcass parameters. The use of rubberized slats reduced the number of
cattle with foot and leg issues (12.0% for control vs. 5.7% for rubber, P<0.003), and also reduced
the number of cattle which did not finish on slats and had to be removed for all reasons (14.2%
for control vs. 7.6% on rubber, P<0.002). It also reduced the dirtiness of cattle on a tag scoring
system of 1 to 5, at 2.4 for rubber and 2.6 for conventional slats (P<0.03). Average daily gain
(ADG) was also improved on rubber early by 0.37 lbs in the feeding period (P<0.008), but this
effect diminished over the feeding periods of 125 to 152 days. Feed conversion and dressing
percentage remained statistically unchanged for animals that were able to complete the finishing
period on slatted floors.
This demonstrates that the attempts to date by feedlot operators to improve animal welfare and
performance using rubberized products are justified and that the likelihood that the product
improves the financial performance of slatted floor barns is high.
Conclusions
This trial shows the use of a rubberized amendment on existing concrete slatted floors results in
the following performance improvements;
• Improved ADG early in the feeding period
• Reduced number of foot and leg issues and total number of cattle removed from slats
• Reduced manure tagging of hides when nearing slaughter weight
Based on statistical analysis of the close-out data collected, there was no change in feed
conversion for cattle that can remain on slats for the entire feeding period when using rubberized
versus conventional slats.
As a result the economic value of EasyFix™ as measured in this trial relates to;
• Improved ADG of 0.37 lbs per head in the first 28 days of the feeding period
• Reduced number of cattle that cannot finish on concrete slats
• Reduced labour costs associated with removing animals from group (‘pulls’)
• Therefore, economic value in this project should be calculated based on the costs of rearing
6.7% of cattle in hospital pens vs. base production facility plus ‘pull’ costs, plus mortality in
hospital pens attributed to morbidity in cattle originally coming from concrete slats, each of
which would have been required to be preventable on rubberized slats.
• When installed at $8.75 per square foot and depending on the costs associated with hospital
pens, mortality in these pens and loss of performance due to lameness, payback may range
from 7 to 13 years without any contribution for improved performance seen early in the
feeding period.