Research Update: Liliana Rivas and Cow Efficiency

Summary

Podcast Summary: Cattle Chat – Research Update: Liliana Rivas and Cow Efficiency

Podcast: Cattle Chat (Beef Cattle Institute, Kansas State University)
Episode: Research Update: Liliana Rivas and Cow Efficiency
Date: February 6, 2026
Host(s): Dr. Brad White, Dr. Bob Larson, Dr. Philip Lancaster, Dr. Dustin Pendell, Dr. Scott, Special Guest: Liliana Rivas

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Episode Overview

This episode of Cattle Chat features a deep dive into the latest research at Kansas State University on two main topics:

1. Leaky gut in cattle, focusing on diagnosis and its implications, presented by grad student Liliana Rivas.
2. Cow efficiency modeling—what it is, how it’s measured, and how mathematical models compare to real-world results.

The discussion offers practical takeaways for beef producers and veterinarians, highlighting ongoing research needs and surprising findings in cattle nutrition and reproduction.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Getting to Know Liliana Rivas (03:10–04:03)

• Liliana is a Colorado native who had no cattle experience until coming to Kansas State University.
• Progressed from working with dairy cows in her undergraduate studies to pursuing a master’s degree focused on cattle health and nutrition.
• Liliana appreciates learning to analyze scientific literature and real research data:

  “I feel like I know how to read scientific literature better. I’m working through a lot of data analysis, and it’s all pretty cool to be a part of.” (00:50)

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2. Understanding Leaky Gut in Cattle (04:03–05:50)

• Technical term: Gastrointestinal permeability.
• Dr. Philip explains:

  “What we think is happening ... is that paracellular transport, so molecules going between cells in the GI tract, increases for whatever reason...the tight junctions between cells that keep stuff out ... are weakened, and that allows molecules and even bacteria to cross into the bloodstream.” (04:25)

• Suspected causes: Nutritional stress (feed restriction, high starch diets), heat stress, changes to the microbiome.
• Knowledge Gaps: It’s not clear how frequently leaky gut occurs, what all the causes are, or exactly how it impacts cattle health.

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3. Potential Consequences for Cattle (06:34–07:27)

• Main concerns:
  • Bacteria entering the bloodstream.
  • Disruption of mineral uptake and possibly interference with feed-grade antibiotics.
• Dr. Scott’s perspective:

  “You shower the bloodstream with bacteria—that’s probably not good ... Some of the other like metal type things that we have fairly regulated uptake for could be disrupted ...” (06:48)

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4. How is Leaky Gut Diagnosed? (07:27–08:08)

• No gold standard test.
• Common research methods:
  • Feeding indigestible sugars or minerals like chromium and measuring their presence in blood or urine.
• Dr. Brad summarizes:

  “So you feed them something that shouldn’t cross over ... If it shows up [in blood or urine] ... you go, ‘Ah, there’s leaky [gut].’” (07:46)

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5. Liliana’s Research on Leaky Gut (08:08–11:22)

Research Design:

• Used two indigestible sugars, measured in blood at multiple time points over 36 hours to test permeability.
• Induced leaky gut via feed restriction:

  “We restricted their feed by quite a bit ... to 25% of that intake.” (09:11)

• Focused on yearling (ruminating) calves, ~600–700 lbs to build on previous research that primarily used pre-weaned calves.

Findings:

• Feed restriction reliably induced leaky gut in all animals.
• Both test sugars crossed into the blood, but one did so more consistently, suggesting a better tool for future research.
• Detectable sugar levels occurred between 3 and 36 hours after dosing.

"We found that both sugars were able to cross—one sugar more than the other, or more consistent than the other, which may be a better research tool for us moving forward." (10:20)

Practical Application:

• This method could allow producers/vets to test for leaky gut over a generous window (3–36 hours).
• Next steps: Broader studies, testing across different diets and older cows.

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6. Broader Leaky Gut Impacts & Future Research (11:52–12:27)

• Potential connections between leaky gut and other cattle diseases (e.g., respiratory disease).
• Liliana’s work will expand to younger calves in the future.

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7. Cow Efficiency: Definitions and Modeling (12:27–20:56)

What is Cow Efficiency? (12:27–13:53)

• Dustin: From an economic/production angle, efficiency = outputs relative to input use.
• Philip:

  “We used the same measure [as previous work]: pounds of calf weaned per pound of feed consumed per cow exposed to the bull.” (13:29)

Measurement Challenges (14:23–16:01)

• Measuring actual feed intake on pasture is extremely difficult—models must estimate intake.
• Used a nutrition model validated against a tightly controlled pen-feeding trial.

Model vs. Real World (16:03–17:24)

• Energy-restricted cows in reality lost more body weight, condition, and fertility than the models predicted.
• The model did not capture dramatic drops in reproductive performance seen in severe feed restriction.

“Our mathematical representation ... is not matching in the real world ... What that’s telling Bob and I, is that we’re missing something in the way we understand how energy restriction impacts reproductive performance of cows.” (16:03)

Why the Mismatch? (17:42–19:48)

• Models may underestimate both postpartum infertility and the depth of fertility impact caused by poor nutrition.
• Dr. Bob Larson on model limitations and practical animal husbandry:

  “I love using math to describe biology, but I understand there are limits...There is still the animal husbandry, the art side of managing cows... So putting together the art and the science is really still very important.” (18:47)

Big vs. Small Cows (19:48–20:37)

• Larger cows aren’t necessarily less efficient; efficiency varies within herds.
• Identifying the most efficient individual cows is tough since it requires impractical intake tracking in real-world ranches.

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8. Take-Home Messages for Producers (20:37–22:05)

• Monitor cow body condition, especially before calving, to support fertility and efficiency.
• Math and models can guide but have limits:

  “Our basic understanding of what it takes to be a good efficient cow is ... have her in good body condition going into calving, make sure nutrition is adequate ... as long as when things go well, we’re pretty happy with how that goes.” (20:56)

• Severe undernutrition has a greater negative effect on reproduction than models may predict; hands-on management remains crucial.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On daring Olympic sports:

  “I’m going head first, man. Full send.” – Dr. Scott (01:47) “I think I’ll go head first, cuz, I mean, you get injured, you get injured.” – Liliana Rivas (02:52)

• On leaky gut’s unknowns:

  “I don’t know if guts didn’t used to leak and now they do, or we’ve ... gotten some evidence that...might affect whole body health.” – Dr. Bob Larson (05:17) “There’s so many unknowns right now about this leaky gut phenomenon that we don’t have a good way to understand it or to prevent it.” – Dr. Philip Lancaster (05:50)

• On science and practicality:

  “Sometimes I overestimate how good my math is describing biology...” – Dr. Bob Larson (18:46) “There is still the animal husbandry, the art side of managing cows... So putting together the art and the science is really still very important.” (18:47)

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Key Timestamps

• 00:50: Liliana on her education and research outlook
• 04:25: Dr. Philip explains leaky gut (GI permeability)
• 06:48: Dr. Scott discusses leaky gut consequences
• 07:46: Blood/urine testing method for leaky gut
• 08:11–11:22: Liliana details her experiment and findings
• 13:29: Philip defines cow efficiency metric
• 16:03: Model vs. real-world findings in cow efficiency
• 18:46: Importance of blending math with animal husbandry
• 20:56: Practical takeaways on managing body condition and nutrition

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Takeaways & Closing Thoughts

• Ongoing research like Liliana’s is refining tools and understanding for better cattle health management, especially for conditions like leaky gut with complex, underexplored impacts.
• Efficiency modeling offers valuable guidance, but on-the-ground observation and management are irreplaceable, particularly in guarding against the reproductive costs of poor body condition.
• This episode strikes a balance between scientific exploration and real-world insight, highlighting the value of both for beef producers and veterinarians.

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For further questions or topic requests, listeners are encouraged to reach out to the BCI team via email or social media.

Transcript

[A]

Hi, welcome to BCI Caltech. I'm Brad White. Happy to have you with us today and happy to have our crew here in the studio. Morning, Dustin. Good morning, Philip.

[B]

Hello, guys.

[A]

Bob.

[C]

Hello, everybody.

[A]

Scott.

[C]

Good morning.

[A]

So. And our special guest today, Liliana, who's one of our graduate students. Good morning, Liliana.

[D]

Morning.

[A]

How are you this morning?

[D]

I'm doing good. How are you?

[A]

Good. We're happy to have you here to talk about some of your research on leaky gut. We're going to learn a little bit about what that is, what it means, and some of the things that you've done to be able to better identify it in cattle. Some of that research you've done with Dr. Lancaster, who also was lead on a paper that just came out, relative to cow efficiency, which we'll discuss as well as we go through those topics. It's important if you have a question for us, we really appreciate. If you send those in, you can send them to us at bcisu Edu or. Or you can reach out to us on our social media platforms and send your questions or topics that way. One of the things. Guys, we're wrapping up here Winter Olympics. And I had a question for you this morning as you watch those Winter Olympics. And I figured you guys would be really good at several Olympic sports, and I kind of picked out which you'd be good at. But what I wanted to know is if you had to do one, either the skeleton or the luge. And remember, those are the ones that go down really fast. The luge, you're going feet first. The skeleton, you go head first. Which one are you gonna do? You can't. I'm not letting you do the bobsled where you're protected. You're just basically on that sled going down full speed. Skeleton or luge?

[B]

I do not remember those Olympic events.

[C]

Oh, yeah, it's basically bobsled.

[B]

Yes.

[C]

Competitive sledding.

[A]

Yeah. You're going super fast.

[C]

I'm going head first, man.

[A]

Head first.

[C]

Full send. Yeah. That's the least critical damage that I could possibly. Now I got to go feet first because I. I had a pretty dang good injury. Going head first as a. Actually. And I can't even say I was.

[B]

Like, know what's wrong with you?

[C]

I was like 25 years old and I was way over estimating my ability to control a sled going down head first on a pretty steep hill.

[A]

And you have the steel plate there, Cousin Ed.

[C]

I think I took more. I was doubling up on ibuprofen and Advil. And I was, ah. My head hurt. It hurt.

[A]

Okay, so feet first, feet first for me. Dustin, how fast do they go? Like 100 miles an hour.

[C]

I mean, fast 100.

[A]

No, I don't think it's quite that fast, but it's fast. Faster than you want. Go ahead first. Might as well, right?

[C]

And just go all in.

[B]

Yeah, I mean, I don't want to go feet first and be maimed for the rest of my life. Might as well go head first and die.

[C]

I want to hear what Liliana's choice is.

[D]

I think I'll go head first, cuz, I mean, you get injured, you get injured. It's the head I'm going to worry.

[C]

About that I'm there to win. You're more aerodynamic going head first.

[D]

Yeah.

[A]

Bunch of daredevils here. So maybe, maybe we'll see if there's a local L track and we can.

[C]

Try do that as a group. Group looging.

[A]

So we're gonna jump into Liliana's research. But before we do that, tell us a little bit about you, Liliana.

[D]

So I'm from a town in Colorado. It's a very large actually city. And I never had experience with cattle before I came to Kansas. I did my bachelor's here at Kansas State. I'm now getting my master's and then hopefully vet school.

[A]

Well, and when you were an undergrad, one of the things that you were able to do is you started working at the dairy. You got involved with cattle. You really liked the health, nutrition aspects and what could you do? Which is what led you to do your master's.

[D]

Yes.

[A]

And then so far, how. How is your master's program going? It's putting you on the spot in front of your professor here, Dr. Lancaster.

[D]

But it's going really well. I feel like I've improved in a lot of different aspects. Like, I feel like I know how to read scientific literature better. I'm working through a lot of data analysis, and it's all pretty cool to be a part of.

[A]

Yeah, I think it's. It's great to be a part of that research process. And before we dive into a research. Philip, I'm going to turn to you and ask. Leaky gut is something that we've had a lot of questions about in the last few years. Maybe just give us a primer on what is. What is leaky gut? What's the technical name, what's going on, what's the process?

[B]

Well, so those are all great questions that I don't know, that we have a Solid answer to the. The technical name is gastrointestinal permeability. And so what we think is happening based on some of the markers and stuff that we use is that the paracellular transport, so molecules going between cells in the GI tract increases for whatever reason. So basically the tight junctions between cells that keep stuff out that's not supposed to get into the bloodstream are weakened and that allows molecules and even bacteria to cross into the bloodstream. And then we end up with, you know, inflammation and other things. And I don't think we really know what the consequences of that is to a good degree.

[C]

Yeah, I mean, it's interesting. This is not a topic I was taught in veterinary school. I don't remember reading any papers until relatively recently. So I don't know if guts didn't used to leak and now they do, or we've kind of gotten some evidence that there's some things going on in the intestinal tract that might affect whole body health. And so it is an interesting position between nutrition and veterinary medicine that again, we've known all along that nutrition and veterinary medicine have a lot of overlaps, but this is a really tight connection between the two.

[B]

Yeah, because some of the things that we do know that, that appear to cause it are nutrition related, like feed restriction, maybe high amounts of starch, things that disrupt the microbiome in the intestine lead to increased permeability. But we don't have a good handle on how often it happens, you know, the different things that cause it. We know heat stress seems to cause it, some dietary changes and things seem to cause it or increase it. I'm not sure if it's not even there at a basal level, you know, lots of the time. There's just so many unknowns right now about this leaky gut phenomenon that we don't have a good way to understand it or to prevent it.

[A]

So Scott, if we had increased gastric permeability and we're letting bacteria come across or we're letting other things come across, what's the consequences of that or what, what are the potential things that you could see which would be a problem for the animal?

[C]

First thing that comes to mind, you shower. The bloodstream of bacteria is probably not good. That's the first thing where I would stop. But then you worry, from my perspective, you worry about some of the other like metal type things that we have fairly regulated uptake for could be disrupted and could be disrupting some of the trace mineral supplementation and even I'm wondering about feed grade antibiotics. And some of those things do they have, you know, if the permeability changes are our dosing things that we use. Not applicable in all situations.

[A]

Yeah. And I think any of those could be potential problems. The challenge is. And what is the gold standard for diagnosing this, Philip?

[B]

I don't know that we have one. In studies that I've read, I've seen them use indigestible sugars, and that's been used in humans quite a bit. But then some. Some studies have used, like, chromium, which is a metal element that's a mineral, and they've. All right, those are the main things that I've seen used.

[C]

So basically what you're saying is, so you feed them something that shouldn't cross over into the bloodstream, and then you measure the blood and see does it show up? It shows up. You go, ah, there's leaky.

[B]

So they've done a couple different ways, taking blood samples to see if you measure it in the blood. And then they've also done, like, urine collections and then see if it's in the urine. Yes.

[A]

So, Liliana, what did you do in your project?

[D]

So we actually used two different indigestible sugars to test this. And we took blood at multiple time points throughout 36 hours. And then we analyzed the samples for sugar serum concentration.

[A]

So basically, just as they were describing, you gave an indigestible sugar that should not be found in the bloodstream. It should just pass through the GI tract and pass out. But if you find it in the blood, you might have leaky gut. And did you do this on just any calves that didn't have leaky gut, or did you induce leaky gut in some way?

[D]

No. So we actually induced leaky gut. And as Dr. Lancaster previously mentioned, we did this by feed restriction. We restricted their feed by quite a bit and pretty much almost assumed that that would induce leaky gut from previous studies.

[A]

Okay, so other studies have shown that feed restriction. So were you. You were feeding them full feed and then you cut it back by how much? Or were you feeding them hay and grain or. Tell me a little bit more about that. I'm just trying to visualize what would cause leaky gut. And when you say quite a bit, what does that mean?

[D]

Yeah, so we were feeding them just standard grass hay, and they were able to eat as much as they wanted. We call that ad libitum. And we then restricted them to 25% of that intake.

[A]

Okay, so a pretty severe restriction for a short period of time.

[D]

Yes.

[A]

And that Induced leaky gut. And these were, I'm assuming since we were feeding them hay, we didn't describe the cattle. These were calves, but they would be ruminating calves at that point. How, how big were these?

[D]

Yeah, they were yearling calves. They're about 6, 700 pounds I believe. And that's because a lot of research is done in pre weaned calves. Not so much done in functioning ruminants.

[A]

Yeah, because that rumen could mess up if we're going to get leaky gut. And where does it leak? And I didn't ask where it leaks across because I don't think we really know where in the GI tract we.

[B]

Don'T have a good handle. There's some studies, I'll say some, I think maybe one or two that tend to show that the lower small intestine tends to be one of the most permeable locations. So like the ileum is a pretty highly permeable location.

[A]

So Liliana, what'd you find?

[D]

We found. Well, because we induced permeability, all animals had leaky gut. And we found that both sugars were able to cross one sugar more than the other or more consistent than the other, which may be a better research tool for us moving forward.

[A]

So based on this finding, if I had an animal that had, I wanted to know if they had leaky gut potentially I could give them that sugar and then test. Can I test right away or how soon can I do that test? How soon did you find it? Crossing the barrier.

[D]

Yeah. So we, we did, I believe 13 time points we took directly after dosing Sugars up to 36 hours. We found that anywhere between three and 36 hours would be an acceptable sampling time point. The sugars had a high probability of being detected at any of those times.

[A]

So pretty, pretty long period. But that may be related to passage rate and could be different if we weren't feeding a complete forage diet than if we were feeding something else. What's the next step for this line of research?

[D]

I think the next step for this would to be to test it on a bigger population, a different ration maybe. Cause a lot of permeability stuff can happen in dairy cows too. So I think looking at older cows and different rations would be.

[A]

Yeah. Cause there's been some work done in dairy. Right. But not a lot in the feed yard environment. Just. Just a little bit.

[B]

Yeah. I mean there's been some stuff done in growing calves, things like that, but I haven't seen much like in a true feedlot environment.

[A]

Yeah. And based on Based on Scott's comments, you could see this being an adjunct to other causes of morbidity. So how does this play in with respiratory disease? How does it play in with some of our other syndromes that we see? That would be interesting to find, and that's an area of further research to go forward. So, Liliana, we sure appreciate you sharing with us and we're interested when you come back and can tell us a little bit more about this because I know you've done some stuff with younger calves as well that we'll have to talk about in the future to describe when you get your results finalized there.

[D]

Yes. Thank you for having me.

[A]

Next thing I want to talk about and Philip, you guys have done a paper looking at cow efficiency, but I want to ask Dustin a little bit first to maybe define. And we'll see if this is the same definition that you guys use. Define cow efficiency or what you would look at from an economic standpoint, Dustin? Well, I don't. Yeah, this is why I'm putting you. I'm putting you on the spot and we'll see if Philip did the right thing. Well, I mean, there's a lot of different measures of efficiency. So I don't know how economic efficiency. We talk various production measures and so. Yeah, with what? Well, what would be some of the things that you would want to measure from an economic or production standpoint? So, you know, economics, we talk a lot about like technical efficiency, allocator efficiency, looking at outputs, taking. It's a combination of outputs, measuring outputs relative to input use, and so some kind of measure along those lines. And I'm assuming that's probably what you did, is I'm guessing, perfect Z in the ballpark. Phil.

[B]

Yeah. So the measure of efficiency that we use, because when we did this analysis, we compared it to a previous paper. So we used the same measure they did, which was the pounds of calf weaned per pound of feed consumed per cow exposed to the bull. So we get a input.

[A]

You got like a triple division.

[B]

Yes, it is ratio over ratio, but we get an output pounds of calf weaned. We've got a major input, which is the pounds of forage consumed or feed consumed. And we incorporate the reproductive performance there with looking at per cow exposed. And so we tried to. So we looked at this on a herd level. So this is not necessarily looking at an individual cow. This is looking at it on a herd level. And because we've got that reproductive component involved there.

[A]

Yeah. And so the reproduction sounds pretty straightforward to measure the pounds of caffeine sounds pretty straightforward to measure the pound of feed consumed. I'm not sure how you measured that in grazing cows.

[B]

Yeah, that's, that's the problem with trying to evaluate or measure cow efficiency in a real situation is because measuring forage intake of grazing animals is nearly impossible. We've got some ways to get a ballpark estimate, but we're, I mean, it's a big ballpark. There's a lot of variation there. And so it's not very precise. And so what we did was we're using a nutrition model to estimate the intake of the cows. And in this case, because we were replicating a study that in the study that they actually did, they put the cows in individual pens and actually fed them certain amounts. And so they regulated the amount. And so what we did was try to replicate that to see how well our nutrition model would replicate a real world study where they knew the actual amount of feed consumed. And then if the idea was if it replicates that well, then maybe we should, we would be able to do a pretty good job of replicating cows on pasture or whatever. In the nutrition model, the animals were assumed to consume a certain amount of feed and energy that every day throughout the production cycle.

[A]

And so what did you find?

[B]

So the interesting part was that in the real world study, the cows that were restricted in energy lost body condition and lost weight, which is expected. And their reproductive performance dropped off quite dramatically in those cows that were restricted in our model. Our cows lost body weight, they lost body condition, but not as much as the cows in the real world study. And the way we modeled reproductive efficiency was an increase in postpartum interval and that changed. That increased quite a bit in cows that were feed restricted. But the actual pregnancy percentage didn't drop off much at all compared to the real world study that dropped off quite dramatically at low energy intakes. And so what that's telling, Bob and I, is that we're missing something in the way we understand how energy restriction impacts reproductive performance of cows.

[A]

The equations don't match what happens in the, in the.

[B]

Yeah, our mathematical representation of what should, what we think should happen does, is not matching in the real world in this particular case. And this is, this was a case where they severely restricted those cows. And that's what we want to try to model to see if we're doing a good job of that. And it appears we're not very well.

[A]

Well, it makes sense to do a mathematical model because you can't really measure the, the amount of feed intake but even back to what you and both Dustin said is if you want to measure outputs and look at inputs and compare the ratio between the two, you need to know. You need to know feed intake. Bob, what do you think was going on with the repro?

[C]

Yeah, I don't. I don't know for sure. One of the things there's. There's two ways we think about a thin cow having reproductive performance problems. One is she just, you know, after she calves, there's a period when she's not fertile for 50 days, 60 days, 70, 80 days until she resumes fertility after calving. And we know that a thin cow, that's a longer period of time, and our model actually does that. But maybe we're underestimating how much that delays her return to fertility. The other thing is the impact on fertility itself. And so fertility itself is, yes, she comes back into heat and she ovulates, but we don't get a successful pregnancy from that. So. And again, there's some evidence that poor nutrition does impact fertility, but again, the math models would say a little bit. And so the real question is maybe it's more than we have thought before, or this period of infertility is longer than our math equations are telling me. And it's the. Sometimes math, I love math, but it can look over precise. Right. So if I take a bunch of samples, I can give you an average or whatever.

[A]

But.

[C]

But is that true for cows? Managed a little bit different or in a different situation. And sometimes I overestimate how good my math is describing biology. I love using math to describe biology, but I understand that there are limits. And so from a practical standpoint, one of the things that Philip and I have been talking about is from a practical standpoint, there's two things I think that really need to be done. One is we as researchers need to work on these math equations that they're not quite telling us the truth about biology or at least about the cows we have today. And we want that math equation because we want to ask these questions, you know, so a rancher that has a set land base, they want to know do they want bigger cows or more smaller cows? And we want to answer those questions. The other thing is there is still the animal husbandry, the art side of managing cows, managing how much forage is disappearing, manage how the cows are performing. And so putting together the art and the science is really still very important.

[B]

Yeah, so you mentioned the small cows and big cows. And so, you know, when we've talked cow efficiency in the past, and lots of people talk this way. Well, big cows consume more feed and more for maintenance than smaller cows and so on. But some of the research I've seen, bigger cows are not necessarily less efficient, smaller cows are not necessarily more efficient. But within a herd there are definitely cows who consume less and produce the same. And so there are cows that are more efficient within a herd. And we want to be able to get to the point where we can try to estimate those and identify those cows. But like we said, measuring forage intake of a grazing cow is impossible and not very practical at all on a ranch situation with the intensive measurement that has to happen to actually even try to do it in a research situation setting.

[A]

So in this scenario you figured out the math didn't quite replicate what's going on in reality. But along the way I'm sure you guys had a couple things that you learned. So I want to know a couple take homes that if I'm a producer and I want to use some of the. And it may not be directly from your study, but in general, what did you learn?

[C]

One thing is back to some of the things we know about animal husbandry is monitor body condition. We want those cows to go into the calving season in animals in an adequate body condition because when they do that, then they do perform like we expect them to. They have that period of infertility that's kind of predictable and they have the chance to come back in and get pregnant early in the breeding season. So the take homes. Our basic understanding of what it takes to be a good efficient cow is well, have her in good body condition going into calving, make sure the nutrition is adequate up and down through the breeding season so that fertility is not negatively impacted. And so as long as when things go well, well, then we're pretty happy with how that goes. I think one of the things our study would say is maybe the math would underestimate how bad things can affect how bad going into the calving season then really is. And I think, you know, being a veterinarian in the field, I think I saw that sometimes that you would have pretty poor breed ups and you're a long way from cows actually, you know, starving to death, but they were thin enough that they just didn't perform very well.

[A]

It does greatly impact reproduction. So appreciate you guys sharing that and appreciate Liliana, you sharing your research with us. Thanks for joining us. If you have questions or topics you'd like us to discuss, you can send us an email at bcisu Edu.