Livestock producers in some of the drier areas of the province have been busy trying to line up extra feed supplies for this year
 
Murray Fiest is a Ruminant Nutrition Specialist with Saskatchewan’s Ministry of Agriculture.

He cautions people need to know what their buying and suggests they ask for a feed test.

He explained the feed test provides some key information, "the feed analysis takes a lot of the guess work out if feed has been put up you don't want to be surprised by having excessive fiber and not enough energy, taking a look at what the protein content is. The benefit is not only do you know what kind of feed you have relative to what the species of livestock you are feeding and what they require."

Producers looking to line up extra feed can check the province’s Forage, Feed and Custom Services listing on the Ministry of Agriculture website. 

Some area’s of the province got hit with frost on Saturday night with the coldest area being around Val Marie where the temperature dropped to -2.4.

Frost can have a big impact on crops including those being looked at for feed said Fiest, "where we get really concerned is not only how cold it got but just for how long of duration that frost lasted for, and those two parameters will effectively tell us or impact each crop at varying degrees of severity."

He said once a killing frost has occurred nitrates can get locked into the plant to the point where it can impact feed quality.