Interpretive Summary: Supplementing Ca Salts of Soybean Oil to Late-gestating Beef Cows

 

A recent study published in the Journal of Animal Science compared the performance and physiological responses of the offspring from cows supplemented with calcium salts of soybean oil (CSSO) or prilled saturated fat (CON) during late gestation. Maternal nutrition is a major factor in development of fetal organ systems associated with health, production, and reproduction; currently, the majority of research within this field is focused on energy and protein nutrition and limited information exists about the potential impacts of supplementing polyunsaturated fatty acids to gestating cows on offspring productivity.Therefore, the research team hypothesized that CSSO supplementation to late-gestating beef cows would improve lifelong offspring productivity via programming effects.

Video: How the corn-soy diet transformed swine nutrition

At the 2026 ASAS Midwest Section meeting, Dr. Robert Easter, professor emeritus of swine nutrition at the University of Illinois, spoke at the U.S. Soy sponsored Swine Application Symposium, offering a historical perspective on one of the most important developments in modern pig production: the corn-soybean meal diet. What today is considered a foundational feeding strategy was not always obvious or even accepted.