Loose Minerals

[arlen]

I was wondering what you guys do for minerals.
I've always put out a salt block and loose minerals, but the loose minerals seemed to last forever. It would form a solid block after a few days.
I got to thinking that the loose minerals contain a fair amount of salt, and if I took the salt block away maybe they would start consuming more minerals.
Well, it worked, they are lapping up the loose minerals good now. Just wondering if there could be negative consequences.
I had an unusually crappy hay crop this year, my first crop got rained on for 5 days straight. It's not dusty or moldy, just think it lost allot of minerals and vitamins.

Do any of you have a recommendation for a loose supplement that has vitamins also?

[zephyrhillsusan]

We buy the Sweetix Copperhead 6% mix that is formulated especially for Appalachia, which our area is considered to be part of. We've also bought a Crystalyx Breed-up protein tub which has a lot of vitamins and minerals. You do need to feed salt along with it, so we also put out the loose copperhead mineral. I've inquired about it, and I don't think they can overdose on a good quality mineral. They will probably eat a lot until they make up for any imbalance, then even out to a regular consumption rate. We used to use salt blocks until I learned that the red trace mineral blocks are over 90% salt with very little of any actual minerals. It's also hard for cattle to lick them enough to get adequate minerals that way, but since they are getting lots of salt, it can stop them from eating the good minerals. The Sweetlix minerals are formulated with a rain block so that they may crust over in the rain, but they won't form a rock-hard mass.

[arlen]

Thanks for the info. I looked up the Sweetlix, and it's pretty close to what I've been feeding. It's nice to know that I'm not totally crazy (unless we both are).
I'm gonna probably put a couple more lick tubs out there too. They eat them up pretty fast. I wish I could put out the 24% ones, but the label says that they are not recommended for horses, and I have 1 horse, a donkey, and 2 miniature donkeys sharing pasture with the cows now.