bottle raising a steer?

[oceanmist]

anyone on here ever bottle raised a beef/ dairy steer?

what sort of expenses go into it? I have a LOT of grass, I would like to pasture raise it more than grain feed it.

what could I expect to pay for the calf?

How long to feed? 3 weeks or more?

Problems I could encounter? Pnuemonia?

What's a good weight to put him in the freezer?

Or what about raising it and halter breaking it and training it for a 4h kid?

Thanks Misty

[Shawna]

We are just starting to raise beef on our homestead. We have 7 currently (had 10 but lost three). I am probably not the best to answer these questions (perhaps on the cow forum...lots of knowledgeable people there!), but will answer by what we have learned so far.

anyone on here ever bottle raised a beef/ dairy steer?

Our oldest steer is now almost 9 months old. We got most of them as 3-day-old calves, some were a week, give or take a day or two.

what sort of expenses go into it? I have a LOT of grass, I would like to pasture raise it more than grain feed it.

We grain feed ours. We barter work for our grain, though, so luckily we don't have to pay for that (although feed prices are going up). My dad cut hay and gave us that this year, so that was another expense we didn't have (he's older and had no use for hte hay, so he asked if we wanted it!). We bottle fed, and the milk replacer was around 60.00 a bag (each calf gt one bag which lasted about a month). We also buy minerals for our calves, which we failed to do initially, which is why we lost two of our calves (they each broke on of their back legs when another, bigger calf, decided to get frisky). We also buy protein pellets to mix in with thier corn, which costs us around 33.00 for a two-week supply (for 7 calves). And if you have to treat with any medications, you have that expense as well.

what could I expect to pay for the calf?

Depends on what kind you get. We paid 130.00 each for our holsteins, but paid only 10.00 each for our jerseys. We buy ours from local dairy farms.

How long to feed? 3 weeks or more?

We bottle feed for a month.

Problems I could encounter? Pnuemonia?

Pnuemonia is a possibility....scours are the biggest obstacle with young calves. We keep everything as clean as possible (pens, water/feed buckets, bottles, etc), keep our calves separated in the first month or so, and we have still encountered problems with scours.

What's a good weight to put him in the freezer?

We are sending our first jersey in sometime in July, which would make him 14 months. I know dh wants them to be about a year before sending them in. This probably depends ont he breed also. Our holsteins would have been ready about the same time as our first jersey, but they were almost 2 months younger.

Or what about raising it and halter breaking it and training it for a 4h kid?

Of course! This was how I earned money growing up....taking a steer to the fair each year

Good luck! Post over on the cow forum....they know alot more there than I do!!!


Shawna

[BeltieBandit]

Originally Posted by oceanmist

anyone on here ever bottle raised a beef/ dairy steer?

what sort of expenses go into it? I have a LOT of grass, I would like to pasture raise it more than grain feed it.

what could I expect to pay for the calf?

How long to feed? 3 weeks or more?

Problems I could encounter? Pnuemonia?

What's a good weight to put him in the freezer?

Or what about raising it and halter breaking it and training it for a 4h kid?

Thanks Misty

Misty,

We have raised bottle calves, but to be honest with you, we did not have a good experience. When you get the calves from the dairy lines, they are supposed to have gotten the dams collostrum, but that was not always true, especially if they are male calves. We experienced a 40% loss due to weakness, scours, etc. Even those calves that made it to solid food, and started growing, were still at risk during their first winter. It was troubling for us to see so many die, but I think our experience is not that different from others. I believe that when you go against the nature of an animal, you ask for problems. Those calves are supposed to get their collostrum AND their immune system from their dams, and it is very hard to duplicate that, even with modern drugs and feeds. With that said,

As a rule of thumb, make sure that they at least have 3-5 days on their dam. Individual prices will vary by breed and location. Generally speaking, milk replacer is packaged such that one 50 bag is what a single calf needs. Even if he starts on dry food before it is gone, put milk replacer on the dry food. Make sure that you keep meds for the scours on hand. Sometimes, dairies will keep frozen collostrum on hand for their replace heifers. If you can find some, get it. 4-H would be a great way to have help with your project. The leaders, or older kids may have the experience that you do not yet have. We like to process our cattle at about 900-1000 lbs, although we processed many earlier because we needed the meat. Younger animals not only produce less meat, but it can be tougher because of the lack of marbling. If you are planning to have them forage for their food, you will need to isolate them for the last 2-3 weeks. They can get into weeds at times that will taint the meat with bad tastes. An example we had was with wild onions. Made the meat taste bad, and also tainted some milk from our milk cow. By isolating them, you give them a chance to filter that kind of stuff out of their system. You might also want to give them some grain during that last few weeks.

I hope I haven't discouraged you with our experience, but I sure wished that I would have had more accurate expectations when we did it. Especially since it was the first experience. It was hard to see so many of them die that early in our experience.