Calves have little to no immunity when they are born and therefore rely on colostrum in order to obtain immunoglobulins to fight pathogens they may encounter. If calves have little immunity it means that they are more susceptible to picking up diseases and becoming ill. In order to ensure that there is minimal risk of bacterial infection and to keep your calves healthy, we must pay attention to cleaning and sanitising equipment, ascontaminated feed can be a major risk to young calves.
Automatic calf machines are becoming an increasingly popular option for rearing calves, and although they are a great option when it comes to saving labour, there are some manual tasks that must be carried out in order to achieve optimum calf health.
Minerals are crucial part of any animals diet, whether they are macro minerals which are required in larger amounts, or trace minerals which are required in smaller amounts. Both these types of minerals are equally important and all add up to maintain health and performance. All minerals are available in natural feeds, however in order to achieve the optimum rate of minerals per day, a lot of this natural feed would need to be consumed.
Research trials have shown that feeding higher volumes of milk can lead to many benefits for calf, heifer and cow performance as well as the farmer. However, as we encourage higher litres there is often some reluctancy due to the following myths.
When discussing colostrum management, attention is often focused on the calf. However, to produce a quality-first feed we need to begin with the cow in her transition period. Dam colostrum contains farm-specific antibodies making it so valuable to the calves on that farm, providing protection against the pathogens, they are most likely to encounter.
It is well known that the early introduction of starter feed is essential for rumen development, but often forage is not offered until close to or post-weaning. Many recent studies have shown that offering forage during the pre-weaning phase has benefits in pre-weaning growth rates as well as aiding the transition from a milk-based diet to solid feed.
The importance of colostrum has been well documented, however that we feed calves is often overlooked. With colostrum being so crucial for the future productivity and survivability of the calf, why should we guess or compromise on the quality we put into them.
The quality of colostrum can vary greatly from cow to cow with numerous factors such as: parity, nutrition and breed all influencing colostrum quality. Quality of colostrum cannot be identified from sight alone! Measuring colostrum quality ensures calves get the best possible start in life.
The market is saturated with different milk powders, all with their own niche selling point and most of them promise to provide you with the solution you are looking for (whatever that may be!) I think it is fair to say many farmers look at the oil and protein levels stated on the bag, followed by price per tonne and end up making a relatively uninformed decision.
Having colostrum accessible to calves is imperative to the colostrum feeding program. For reasons such as the cow cannot produce enough colostrum, Colostrum is of low quality, or the freshly calved Cow has not been milked within hours of giving birth. Calves are essentially born with little to no immunity. Therefore, the quality of colostrum is essential for disease prevention during the first weeks of a calf’s life.
The survival of replacement calves and heifers, the subsequent survival of lactating dairy cows in each lactation and the efficient conversion of feed into milk, all contribute to the environmental impact of dairy production.
Additional energy, for every 5% increase in oil the energy density of the powder is increased by 6%.
Reduced scours, energy in milk replacer comes from either fat or carbohydrate (oil or lactose), high fat milk replacers have lower lactose, naturally lowering their osmolality and reducing incidence of scour.
Improved resilience, during periods of stress, disease challenge or low temperatures the calf’s energy requirement increases. Calves have very little body fat stored and rely on a constant supply of energy meaning increased requirements are more easily met with a high fat milk replacer.
