 Scientists at Kansas State University have found that feeding hemp to cows quite literally mellows them out.
In a study published this week in Scientific Reports, Kansas State veterinary researchers Hans Coetzee and Michael Kleinhenz discovered that a diet of industrial hemp “increases lying behavior and decreases biomarkers of stress and inflammation in cattle.” In other words, eating hemp makes cows mellow. Hemp is just cannabis that contains less than 0.3% THC, however it does still contain other cannabinoids, such as CBD, than can have psychoactive, but not intoxicating, effects. Currently, it’s illegal to feed hemp to livestock because the effects of that were unknown, with the concern being that cannabanoids could be potentially passed on through their milk or meat. However, there is an abundance of hemp byproducts available and currently going to waste after utilizing the plants other resources, such as oil, seed, medicines, and fiber. The leftover byproducts are mostly cellulose containing plant material which is perfect for animals such as cows and sheep. If those byproducts, which contain trace amounts of CBD or THC, could be used to feed livestock, it would benefit cattle ranchers and keep waste out of landfills. So, in an effort to find out if hemp could be a potential food source for livestock, the US government recently granted $200,000 to scientists at Kansas State University to study this. And this is where they discovered that the cattle which consumed the hemp were found to spend much more time lying down and much lower levels of stress than the control group. The scientific team states that there is still more research to be done, but the results are certainly intriguing. Comments are closed.
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