Dairy Calf Feed Advice

[highlandview]

I am bottle raising two 2 month old dairy calves. What is everyone's experience or advice with the following - How much milk replacer a day? At what age do you wean? Do you introduce grain? At what age? Do you feed any other supplements, etc.? Has anyone raised a dairy cow on just pasture and hay without grain?

[deineria]

The only input I have is that we bought our Jersey Heifer weaned at 12 weeks and be that average or early, she has maintain a wonderful condition and had good growth since - she is now nearly 11 months old. She was eating grain when we bought her. She was on, I believe, a 22% dairy calf starter - which is hard to find, and we went to an 18%.
She has been on almost ALL grass since late spring - and this is her condition:



I imagine people are getting tired of see pics of Stella at this point - lol!

[springvalley]

She looks wonderful, You can feed without grain, but your calf may get a bit of a hay belly. I always feed my own calf feed, 4 parts whole oats, one part rolled corn, liquid molases, a bit of salt and mineral. And feed a couple lbs. a day, works great>Thanks marc

[topside1]

At two months old there is no need to bottle feed. Yes they need grain, it's called calf starter/grower or mix a blend as mentioned by Marc. You need to give the boys some grain daily to accelerate their growth...How much milk are you feeding now? When did you buy them? Topside

[Callieslamb]

I feed mine 3x a day for a week or so - 3/4 of a 2 at bottle at a time until I can see that they can handle more. Topside gave me great advice a couple years ago - they always want more, so don't let them fool you.

I feed the 22% fat Milk Replacer and had absolutely no trouble with my calves. I was raised to wean them at 8 week, but fed mine 12. I started them on calf manna grain right away- a mouthful at a time until they ate it on their own. When it was time to wean them, they were so insterested in the grain that they never missed the milk.

[topside1]

Highland don't get confused, you can bottle feed them forever if you enjoy it and have the money to keep buying the MR...Callieslamb said it all..Topside

[highlandview]

Originally Posted by topside1

At two months old there is no need to bottle feed. Yes they need grain, it's called calf starter/grower or mix a blend as mentioned by Marc. You need to give the boys some grain daily to accelerate their growth...How much milk are you feeding now? When did you buy them? Topside

I bought them on Mother's Day. They were born in one in early-April and one in mid-April. I am feeding them milk replacer (1 1/2 gallons a day each). I tried giving them some calf starter grain a few weeks ago but the weren't interested. They are eating plenty of pasture and we have good pasture. The nibble at a red mineral block. I may try again with grain today. They are a Dutch-Belted/Jersey mix. They were eating kelp at the farm I bought them from but I can't buy that at my feed store.

[sammyd]

If all they are eating is pasture then you should keep them on milk.
If you can get them to hit the grain you can wean them earlier.
It takes longer for a grass/milk diet to grow a big active rumen than a milk/grain diet.

We don't put them on pasture till after weaning. Usually don't even offer hay till then either.
We wean around 8 weeks and feed either milk replacer or goat milk along with an 18% starter grain and fresh water which is available from the first week.

[topside1]

Cut back on the milk and I'm sure they will become interested in grain...Topside

[Curtis B]

Use your hand to get them a taste for the feed. I tried to have a bucket of grain and a handful when they were finishing the MR. When they try to suck your hand, shove it in. I actually started with sweet feed, the molases in it made it "tastier", then switched to calf starter.

[deineria]

With goats, I have to put the grain in the their mouths if they don't have adults to watch - and you have to do this for days. . .
They will pick up on it.

[Oakshire_Farm]

A good trick that I have learned on encouraging them to eat grain is, give them there milk in a bucket. Once they are a month or so old they easily will drink out of a bucket. Put your grain in the bucket so once they finish there milk they have some soggy grain in the bottom of the bucket, they suck it up and enjoy it that way! Keeps them busy for a while too

I usually wean about 12 weeks, at about 8-10 weeks I cut them back to one milk feeding per day and a bucket of soupy beet pulp and grain mixture. They love warm beet pulp and grain! Eventually just start skipping a milk feeding and give grain, they do not even know they are being weaned! Once they learn to love the beet pulp and grain mix they do not care for the milk any more!

[bigmudder77]

they should be off milk by now make sure there drinking water though and like some one else said as soon as they get done with the milk stick sweetfeed in there mouth 2 days and mine were eating all the grain they could

another thing this works well with calves is if you have a chicken or 2 put them with the calves and feed them grain and they will try to act like the chicken and eat the grain also and drink out of buckets pretty fast

its a little trick you learn when having free range chickens that get in to the cow pen and eat there feed and drink out of there water buckets then the calves would do the same i have yet to train one to get on the bucket after leaving some chickens with them its great cause trying to train them to get on the bucket can be a pain

[Apryl in ND]

Hey that's a pretty good idea. I'm getting a calf soon that's almost weaning age and was wondering if it would help him learn to eat grain if I put him in with a goat or two. Has anyone mixed goats and calves? I'm not sure if they'd bully him or not.