PhosSure – Your weather resistant Phosphate supplement

It is well-known that South Africa is a phosphate-poor country and the addition of phosphate especially during the summer months is nothing new for farmers. Salt phosphate licks are supplied to grazing animals daily to ensure they reach their optimal production and reproduction capacity.

However, licks that need to be thrown away unnecessarily because they get wet and mouldy can cause big headaches and financial losses for producers.

Phosphate (P) is the second most abundant mineral (after Calcium) in the body. It is present in all body cells (mostly in the skeleton) and is important for almost every biochemical process in the body. Apart from a basic P requirement, any production such as growth or lactation will require additional phosphate.

Phosphate supplementation

There is a large variety of P sources available on the market for the South African farmer to choose from these days.  These can range from ready-mixed P6 or P9 products to P12 concentrates for self-mixing of licks. However, the choice of phosphate product will be determined by more than just the cost of the phosphate source per bag. Added value such as the inclusion of trace minerals, weather resistance, constant composition and technical support are just some of the factors that must be considered when purchasing feed phosphates.

When choosing a phosphate product, the amount of rain in the area must be one of the factors that must be considered.  Farmers often suffer huge losses due to licks that get wet and rot during the rainy season. These licks become unpalatable and their intake decrease. The lick must then be discarded and replaced with a new lick. It is often found that for this very reason, farmers do not give phosphate licks at all in the summer. Although ruminants can mobilise phosphate from their skeletal reserves, these reserves cannot last forever and must be replenished constantly. The phosphate requirement in animals is directly related to the energy requirement and therefore the production status that is maintained.  The higher the production status of animals e.g. growth, lactation and pregnancy (as traditionally occurs in summer rainfall areas), the higher the phosphate requirement.

PhosSure

As part of their product range, Yara Animal Nutrition has a unique, weather-resistant product called PhosSure. This product is made of high-quality MDCP. A unique spray-dried molasses product is added to weatherproof the product and add flavour. When this product gets wet from rain, a hard layer is formed on top of the product. This hard layer prevents water from penetrating the product and damaging it. After the rain, animals can break the hard layer and continue to eat the dry, undamaged lick underneath – thus there is no lick that must be thrown away because it is mouldy.

PhosSure is enriched with the most important trace minerals in the right ratio to phosphate and is available as a ready-mix ready to use PhosSure 6 or as PhosSure 12 concentrate that can be mixed 50/50 with salt. The compositions of PhosSure 6 and 12 are as follows:

Table 1 – PhosSure 6 and 12 summation

Die volgende miniumum innames word vir PhosSure 6 en PhosSure 12 met sout aanbeveel:

Tabel 2 – Minimum aanbevole inname

Buy the original name you know, buy PhosSure!

For more information on phosphate supplementation, contact a Yara Animal Nutrition nutritionist on (+27)82-322-0333.