Pinto Bean Hull Bales as Feed?

aganfamily

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Hi! Has anyone here ever used pinto bean hull bales as feed? We have been offered a large number of these bales at a great price, and were told that they make good goat feed, but I can't find any information online about whether or not they would be good for our animals. We have alpacas, a llama, a couple of pigs, and a herd of Nigora, Angora, and Nigerian Dwarf goats. Thanks in advance for any help you can offer!
 

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Greetings and welcome to BYH! I'm sorry I can provide no guidance or information regarding your question. Hopefully someone on the site will be able to provide some sort of answer. I don't even know who to tag as a possible source for an answer... Hope you'll stick around though, and maybe share some pics of your animals. Make yourself at home!
 

OneFineAcre

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You some time see different types of hulls used as a filler in feed.

I would think that they would have some nutritional value, but not as much as a good quality hay.

I base that opinion on the fact that hay is cut while it is still green.

In the case of a bean, most of the energy and nutrition is going to go into the bean from the plant and hull.

Its' kind of like wheat straw. Goats will eat wheat straw, but it doesn't have much nutritional value because the nutrition went into the grains of wheat.
 

greybeard

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I wouldn't exactly call hulls in feed a 'filler'. For many decades, cottonseed hulls, soybean hulls, almond seed hulls have been a mainstay of feeds, and tho I haven't looked hard, I suspect other bean hulls would be close to what soybean hulls are in Total Digestible Nutrients, CP (crude protein) ADF, NDF, and eNDF.
Soybean hulls=
CP-13
TDN-77
ADF-48
NDF-62
eNDF-28
Those are not at all bad numbers--for soybean hulls. Equivalent or better than most alfalfa hay.

Finding data for other beans may be a bit of a chore tho.
For an explanation of the above terms:


"
Crude, acid detergent and neutral detergent fiber: After more than 125 years, crude fiber (CF) is declining in use as a measure of poorly digested carbohydrates in feeds. Its major problem is that variable amounts of lignin, which isn't digestible, are removed in the CF procedure. In the old scheme, the remaining carbohydrates (NFE) were thought to be more digestible than CF despite many feeds having higher CF digestibility than NFE. One reason CF remained in the analytical scheme was its apparent requirement for the TDN calculation.

Improved analytical procedures for fiber have been developed, namely acid detergent fiber (ADF) and neutral detergent fiber (NDF). ADF is related to feed digestibility and NDF is somewhat related to voluntary intake and the availability of net energy. Both measures relate more directly to predicted animal performance and thus are more valuable than CF. Lignification of NDF, however, alters the availability of the surface area to fiber-digesting rumen microorganisms; lignin, therefore, may be added to future tables.

Recently, effective NDF (eNDF) has been used to better describe the dietary fiber function in high-concentrate, feedlot-type diets. While eNDF is defined as the percent of NDF retained on a screen similar in size to particles that will pass from the rumen, this value is further modified based on feed density and degree of hydration.
 

OneFineAcre

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I wouldn't exactly call hulls in feed a 'filler'. For many decades, cottonseed hulls, soybean hulls, almond seed hulls have been a mainstay of feeds, and tho I haven't looked hard, I suspect other bean hulls would be close to what soybean hulls are in Total Digestible Nutrients, CP (crude protein) ADF, NDF, and eNDF.
Soybean hulls=
CP-13
TDN-77
ADF-48
NDF-62
eNDF-28
Those are not at all bad numbers--for soybean hulls. Equivalent or better than most alfalfa hay.

Finding data for other beans may be a bit of a chore tho.
For an explanation of the above terms:


"
Crude, acid detergent and neutral detergent fiber: After more than 125 years, crude fiber (CF) is declining in use as a measure of poorly digested carbohydrates in feeds. Its major problem is that variable amounts of lignin, which isn't digestible, are removed in the CF procedure. In the old scheme, the remaining carbohydrates (NFE) were thought to be more digestible than CF despite many feeds having higher CF digestibility than NFE. One reason CF remained in the analytical scheme was its apparent requirement for the TDN calculation.

Improved analytical procedures for fiber have been developed, namely acid detergent fiber (ADF) and neutral detergent fiber (NDF). ADF is related to feed digestibility and NDF is somewhat related to voluntary intake and the availability of net energy. Both measures relate more directly to predicted animal performance and thus are more valuable than CF. Lignification of NDF, however, alters the availability of the surface area to fiber-digesting rumen microorganisms; lignin, therefore, may be added to future tables.

Recently, effective NDF (eNDF) has been used to better describe the dietary fiber function in high-concentrate, feedlot-type diets. While eNDF is defined as the percent of NDF retained on a screen similar in size to particles that will pass from the rumen, this value is further modified based on feed density and degree of hydration.
Maybe fiber was a better word than filler
I used to buy feed that used cottonseed hulls
My current feed has alfalfa
I'm surprised that soybean hulls are that high in protein
Thanks for sharing
That's good information
 
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Mike CHS

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When I was a youngun we hired out to farmers cutting field pea straw for hay. No idea what the nutritional content was but they always had buyers. Those bales seemed to weigh twice as much as grass hay.
 

OneFineAcre

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When I was a youngun we hired out to farmers cutting field pea straw for hay. No idea what the nutritional content was but they always had buyers. Those bales seemed to weigh twice as much as grass hay.

There is actually a such thing as soy bean hay
It is a different variety of soy bean that what is grown for field soy beans
Less bean and more foliage and can stand up to multiple cuttings
I've never seen any but one of my hay men said he tried a few acres one time
He said it was really nice but he had a hard time getting a good price for it because no one was familiar with it
 

greybeard

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One of the reasons you don't see a lot more bean hay is the same reason you don't see more peanut hay--both are good hay, but it's difficult to get baled, mostly because of problems in raking it into windrows. Takes some extra care and frequent stops to clear the clogs as the plants wind up wrapped the wheels instead of moving down along the rake or tedder.
 

aganfamily

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Thanks for all of the input, everyone! We went ahead and bought some of the bales. The animals really love the actual bean hulls that are in them, but they leave a lot of stems behind. So, is has turned out not to be the best feed, but the hulls seem to be a good treat they enjoy and the leftovers have been put to good use for mud control (we live in the high desert, where the typical fall/winter storm means mud, mud, and more mud, so extra bedding like this to spread in the really muddy areas can be very helpful). Thanks again!
 

Dave Wilson

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Pinto bean hulls make great feed! Grew up in SW Co, south of Dove Creek, (pinto bean capital of the world!) For years that's all we fed to our cows; they got butter ball fat on them! Even cleaned up the stain on the snow!
 
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