The feeding and management of calves greatly influence their lifelong performance. Thus, it’s vital to regard these practices as investments, not expenses. We’re presenting a series of guidelines followed by farmers, emphasizing the crucial role of Vitalsorb Pure lysolecithin in this regard.

1. If wanting to move to once a day feeding, it is ideal to wait until the calves are at least two weeks of age.

2. Consider CMR as a feed, not a drink. Ad-lib clean water is essential from birth for good rumen development and feed intake.

3. Mix CMR thoroughly, ensure there are no lumps.

4. The optimal drinking temperature of CMR solution is 39°C (body temperature).

5. Feeding calves 1.5-2% of their birth weight in CMR powder daily (about 600-800g of CMR solids daily for a 40kg calf). The amount of calf milk replacer fed at each meal depends on the number of times a day you feed, target growth rate, and the fat and protein content of the CMR.

Vitalsorb™ Pure is an emulsifying agent containing phospholipid components to support oil-in-water emulsions for the superior digestion and absorption of dietary fats and oils, particularly saturated fats.

The way calves are fed and managed has a profound effect on their lifelong performance, so it’s crucial to view these practices as investments rather than expenses. We’re introducing a set of guidelines adopted by farmers and highlighting the pivotal role of Vitalsorb Pure lysolecithin in this context.

1. Calves should be feed good quality colostrum or colostrum replacer (at least 15% of their bodyweight, within 12 hours of birth).

2. Calf milk replacers (CMR) can be offered immediately after colostrum feeding.

3. Maintain a high standard of cleanliness throughout the CMR preparation and feeding process to avoid contamination by pathogens.

4. Feed sick calves last to minimize the spread of disease.

5. Calves can tolerate once-a-day feeding, but it isn’t optimal for their welfare, as they can’t ingest enough milk in one feeding. Feeding twice daily, or ad lib feeding allows the calf to consume and digest adequate amounts of CMR, to support good health and growth.

Vitalsorb™ Pure is an emulsifying agent containing phospholipid components to support oil-in-water emulsions for the superior digestion and absorption of dietary fats and oils, particularly saturated fats.

In digestion of fats, it is important for the emulsifier to form a stable emulsion over 90 minutes. Vitalsorb is an emulsifier made of lysolecithin that is able to achieve this stability. As you can observe from the video, the solution is still cloudy after 90 minutes which signifies the emulsion formed by Vitalsorb being stable. The cloudiness is formed due to the fat being suspended in water. Did you know the liver also produces lysolecithin to help with digestion of fats. However, the liver is not able to produce enough lysolecithin to handle all the fats effectively. Therefore, Vitalsorb is a very useful natural assistant in the function of fat digestion.

In the 1990’s, lipids (fats and oils) were cheap; about USD 300/metric ton (1990) therefore adding lipids to feed was a competitive option. However, with the global push towards sustainability, more lipids were used for manufacturing of biodiesels. As a result of using lipids for fuel, lipid prices sky rocketed and at its’ peak during Covid, it was around USD 1800/mt. It has since stabilised at USD 900/mt. However the future of lipid supply looks even tighter (less supply volume) as governments commit to higher biodiesel usage. Due to this trend, we expect lipid prices to keep increasing in the future. With this backdrop, GN Good Nutrition has manufactured lysolecithin to optimise the use of lipids in feed to help farmers reduce costs.

Farmers greatest challenge today is inflation – including high cost of input materials for farming, and yet consumers fighting back on pricing of eggs, meats and fish. GN Good Nutrition streamlines our efforts to alleviate rising cost by innovation. These innovations include increasing the surface area of the additives, manufacturing additives that concentrate on reducing costs and also on reducing pro-inflammatory response of animals. For instance, GN Good Nutrition’s Vitalsorb lysolecithin increases absorbability of oils and lecithin and therefore helps reduce amount oils and lecithin needed in feeds to achieve similar animal and aqua performance. GN’s Mastiguard reduces inflammation from mastitis in cows therefore providing higher milk yields and better milk quality (lower SCC).

GN Good Nutrition focuses on the long game of improving every aspect of animal and people’s livelihood. How can adding lysolecithin to animal feed financially benefit you?

Firstly, nutritionists can work with an energy matrix value benefit that the University of Kasetsart derived in trials using Vitalsorb lysolecithin. The results demonstrated superior nutrient absorption of lipids using Vitalsorb. For more details on the results, do contact us.

Our Ultrasorb Pure technology uses oil in water emulsion to make smaller micelles (oil particles in water).

The main difference is that lysolecithin is an oil in water emulsifier, whereas lecithin is a water in oil emulsifier. That allows lysolecithin to have better emulsification compared to lecithin.

Let’s talk about emulsifiers. So, what is an emulsifier? An emulsifier helps to mix lipids, oils and fats into the water based environment of intestines of the livestock, poultry or fish and shrimps.

How do we know one emulsifier is better than another?
The smaller the fat droplet in the water emulsion, the more easily it is absorbed.

We can’t emphasize enough how important lysolecithin is to create better animal feed.

Since feed formulations adds between 3 – 8% oils and on top of that, fats and grains also contains oils and fats, it is an enormous amount of fats to digest using only internal emulsifiers. Without help of external emulsifiers, a big amount of fats will not be digested nor absorbed. It is important include an emulsifier that will maximise the main function – the digestibility and absorption of lipids.

But what emulsifier to include?

In the case of emulsification power, GN Good Nutrition lysolecithin is far superior to lecithin to digest lipids (fats and oils) and superior nutrient absorption.

Previously, we’ve seen how lysolecithin is produced – through the process of hydrolysis of lecithin. This is a vital step as lysolecithin becomes a more effective emulsifier compared to lecithin for lipids, oils and fats for better absorption in the animal gut.

Why does lysolecithin emulsify fats better?

Lysolecithin is able to make the fat mix with water in the intestines into smaller globules compared to lecithin. The smaller globules present more surface area for enzymes like lipase to digest the fat.