Efficacy of chromium-yeast supplementation for growing beef steers

This experiment was conducted to determine the efficacy of feeding chromium yeast to growing bed steers. Animal growth, gain efficiency, and blood glu cose kinetics were determined in 24 beef steers (initial body weight=253 +/ - 4 kg) fed a corn silage-based diet supplemented with 0 (control), 100, 20 0, or 400 mu g chromium from high-chromium yeast/kg of diet dry matter. Int ravenous glucose tolerance tests (IVGTT) and intravenous insulin challenge tests (MCT) were conducted at 3 and 6 weeks of chromium-yeast supplementati on. There were minimal effects on plasma glucose kinetics during IVGTT and MCT. There were tendencies for glucose clearance rate to increase (p=0.16) and half-life to decrease (p=0.14) during IVICT. However, chromium-yeast su pplementation had no effect (p>0.24) on ADG and gain efficiency, suggesting that chromium-yeast supplementation to unstressed growing calves may not b e beneficial. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.