09/18/08, 04:34 AM
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Joy
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Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Middle TN
Posts: 2,516
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It has been our experience that Jerseys don't get as big as Holsteins if you are looking for a beef. That said, they are still good eating. We have two Jersey bottle babies right now.
You'll need bottles, milk replacer (or a source of actual milk, if you have goats), and some medicine on hand for scours. We keep LA-200 (oxymycin, I think) & needles, terramycin powder, sulmet, immodium (the "people" diarrhea medicine), & electrolytes on hand at all times. When bottle calves get scours, the window for treatment is very small. We also have a tube feeder for them if they get down, but we don't use it very often (2-3 times a year, w/16 bottle calves this last year). Also, get some calf starter feed. You'll need water buckets and either a feed bucket or some type of pan. We nailed cheap cake pans to our stable walls for feed troughs. They'll need either a stall in a barn or somewhere to get out of the weather. We keep ours in a corral attached to our small barn. We have 4 calves in together right now (2 Jerseys & 2 Holsteins), so they can be kept together, but they need room to be able to get away from one another. They can suck on each other's navels, which can cause problems (to put it mildly).
When you purchase them, you want to check their navel to make sure it is dry. You want them to be up & walking around. Check their nose for any discharge, indicating a respiratory problem. Don't worry if they look anorexic. Newborn calves look half-starved at first. They are all legs & ribs.
We give every calf that comes on the property a shot of antibiotics when they arrive, as a preventive measure, but that is just our personal tactic. We'd rather spend a few $$ on the shot than lose a $100 calf (which is what the Holsteins run around here). If they come from the stock barn, we are especially aggressive with medicine if the least little thing looks wrong, healthwise.
Finally, don't overfeed. We give 3 pints, twice a day, rather than 4 pints (2 quarts) as a way to limit our milk replacer cost, and introduce calf starter as soon as they are drinking their bottles well (usually some time within the first week). Our calves now are about 3 weeks old and are drinking their bottles & eating about 1/2 c. of feed each, twice a day.
Hope that helps.
-Joy
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-Joy
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The reason a lot of people do not recognize opportunity is because it usually goes around wearing overalls looking like hard work. --Thomas A. Edison
Last edited by menollyrj; 09/18/08 at 04:33 PM.
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