By LINDA McGURK
Indiana Correspondent

LADOGA, Ind. — What do two trendy microbreweries in Indianapolis have in common with the animal nutrition program at a family farm in Ladoga? Not much, at first glance.

But then, Moody Meats never claimed to be an ordinary meat producer.
So, when owner Adam Moody was approached by Flat 12 Bierwerks on the near-east side of Indianapolis and Thr3e Wise Men Brewing Co. in Broad Ripple about using spent brewers’ grains as livestock feed on his farm, he jumped on the opportunity.

“I like the diversification it brings, versus feeding just corn,” Moody said.
Brewing beer generates a great deal of spent grains, including malted barley and wheat, which are normally treated as a waste product and dumped in the landfill. But brewers’ grains are a good source of un-degradable protein and water-soluble vitamins and can be fed to animals in both wet and dry form. The contents and characteristics of the product vary depending on what type of beer that’s been made.

And, no – it doesn’t make the livestock intoxicated and it doesn’t make the meat taste like beer. In fact, the grains contain no alcohol or chemicals, and because they’re fermented in 180-degree water for four hours, all bacteria are killed, making the grains a food-grade product.

The high-water contents of brewers’ grains, however – at least 65 percent – means it can be expensive to transport. In most cases where brewers’ grains are used as livestock feed, farms source it from a brewery that’s relatively close by.

“I’m all for recycling of products, but it had to make fiscal sense for us to drive an hour to pick it up. With corn at $5 or $6, it does,” Moody said. “Our advantage is that we have trucks coming into Indy to deliver meat anyway.”
Quick delivery is especially important in the summertime, as the product can be susceptible to mold in high temperatures. Moody’s trucks pick up the wet grains from the breweries twice a week and haul the barrels back to the farm, where the product is blended with the regular mix of ground-ear corn, spelt, oats and soybeans that he produces on his own farm.

He currently uses a 30 percent ration of wet brewers’ grains for the beef cattle on the farm, but is working with bovine nutrition researchers at Purdue University to perfect the ration mix.

“We started out with 25 percent and watched how they (the animals) were doing, and they were doing fine, so we increased it to 30 percent,” Moody said. “I don’t think we’re going to go much above 30 to 35 percent until we’ve slaughtered an animal that’s been on the diet for six months, to make sure they’re not getting too high of a sulfur build-up. Purdue has said we have to watch for that.”

The animals also seem to enjoy the addition to their diet, especially the farm’s 1,200 pastured free-range laying hens.

“The hens have hit it pretty hard and are laying really well on it. They are free-choice hens, so they balance themselves on it,” Moody said. “The cattle like it too, but they were a little more curious about it.”

Each hen house of 400 animals goes through approximately 7-8 gallons of brewers’ grains per day. “It’ll be interesting to see what it does with our broiler chickens when we start that program in April or May,” he added.
Moody sells his meat from the butcher shop in Ladoga that he and his wife, Lucy, have owned for the past 10 years, in addition to two more recently acquired retail outlets in Avon and Zionsville. Their product is also served at select restaurants in Indianapolis and delivered through Farm Fresh Delivery.
Scott Wise, owner of Thr3e Wise Men Brewing Co., was already using Moody’s meat products for the pizzas he serves at his eateries when he approached Moody about the brewers’ grains. The new arrangement makes the brewing process a closed loop and goes hand-in-hand with Moody’s commitment to run a sustainable farm with minimal environmental impact.

“This completes the cycle, and I think that’s pretty cool,” Moody said about the partnership.