Iowa Beef Center director column

April 2023

New Guidance on Beef Cattle Implants

With feed costs at their highest level in years, technology that improves feed conversion is more important than ever. High on the list of those technologies are beef cattle implants. Currently available implants have the ability to improve efficiency as much as 30% and feed conversion as much as 20% in finishing cattle when using the right strategy. When developing an implant strategy, the most important implant is the last one before you market the cattle. This might be a calfhood implant if you sell calves at weaning, a stocker implant if you plan to sell the cattle off grass, or the terminal implant in the feedlot. Recently, we have encouraged cattle feeders to time the terminal implant to be 70-80 days prior to market. This timing reduces potential negative impacts on carcass quality while maintaining performance responses. By “thinking backwards” from an estimated market date the overall implant strategy can be developed.

This thinking will soon change. In December of 2021, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) sent a letter to the beef industry stating that after June 2023 reimplanting within a production phase will no longer be permitted unless it is specifically allowed on the label. This eliminates many common and effective reimplant programs. Recent label changes allow reimplanting of a small number of implants within a production phase. Also, longer duration implants (as long as 200 days) are available and give similar responses to many reimplant programs. Delayed implanting is also an option.

To clarify, reimplanting across production phases is still allowed. In other words, you can implant during the cow-calf phase, a stocker phase and the feedlot phase. However, unless specifically allowed on the label your cattle can only receive one implant after they arrive in the feedlot under the new guidance. Be sure and discuss these new guidelines with your veterinarian or nutritionist as you develop your implant strategy.

Growth implants for cattle consist of steroid hormones. And although they’ve been used safely for 50 years, consumers sometimes question the safety of beef from cattle that have been implanted. The publication “Understanding Hormone Use in Beef Cattle” puts the use of hormones into perspective. Foods such as soy proteins naturally have estrogen activity many times the estrogen content of beef from implanted cattle for example. That is not to say that soy based foods are unhealthy. It is just to put into perspective the minute quantities of hormones in implanted beef. Also, the natural production of hormones by both male and female humans is many hundreds of times that of a serving of implanted beef. Regardless of these facts some consumers will request beef from non-implanted cattle. If you want to produce cattle for these markets be sure you have that market confirmed before forgoing that implant. Not implanting will significantly increase your cost of production so a premium is necessary. Some packers have market for verified natural or NHTC (non-hormone treated cattle, for the European market).

Grass time will be here in a month or so. Our popular Fencing and Grazing Clinic will be held on May 16 at the Armstrong Research Farm in southwest Iowa. Topics will include developing a grazing calendar, building your paddocks, water quality testing and new tools for fencing. Look for other forage and grazing educational opportunities from the Iowa Beef Center team throughout the summer.

The IBC at Iowa State University serves as the university’s extension program to cattle producers. Our center comprises a team of faculty and staff from the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, the College of Veterinary Medicine and Iowa State University Extension and Outreach. We work together to develop and deliver the latest in research-based information to improve the profitability and vitality of Iowa’s beef industry. If you’d like to be notified of updates on progress of research projects or programs that might be coming to your area, please subscribe to our “Growing Beef” newsletter by following the link on our website, www.iowabeefcenter.org. If you have a question, use our “Ask our Experts” link. Also, feel free to call us at 515-294-BEEF or email us at beefcenter@iastate.edu. You can also follow @iowabeefcenter on Twitter, YouTube and Instagram and now AgFuse.