Quote:
Originally Posted by linn
You can do once a day milking. The calf won't be able to take all of the milk for quite a while. I would just let the calf run with the cow until she started holding up her milk and milk her out once a day. That way the calf will nurse naturally and not gorge himself/herself which causes disgestive problems. When the calf is old enough to take most of the milk, then you can pen it up overnight and milk in the morning and then let the calf run with the cow all day or milk in the afternoon and let the calf run with the cow all night.
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Yes, what Linn says.
You didn't say what kind of cow you have but most dairy cows will give way too much milk for a calf for the first few weeks. I have a high producing Jersey cow (7-9 gals a day at freshening) and I have to milk her twice a day for a long time before the calf takes most of it. Then the calf gets penned up at night and runs with the cow during the day. I don't leave the calves with the cows anymore because for me the problems created by doing it that way outweigh the benefits.
First problem is the cows will not give me as much cream as they do when they aren't nursing a calf. Some say it isn't so, but it's been my experience every time. With a calf, I get an inch of creamline in my jars. Without the calf I get three to four inches of creamline in there.
Second problem is the calves tend to cut up the teats as they get older and stronger and more demanding about getting the milk. I've heard you can file their teeth down to solve that, but I've never tried. With my cows it usually started when the calves were between three and four months old. I just weaned them rather than trying to deal with cut up teats on my cows.
Which brings me to the most frustrating problem for me. Once that calf has had a taste of momma, even after weaning, they want to get back on her. I had a heifer calf that nursed for 4 months before weaning and was separated from her mother until she was 10 months old. The day I put them back together that heifer walked right up to her mother and started to nurse. I kept her, had her bred and she calved here but I ended up selling her because if it. I never could get her to stop completely.
I bottle feed all my calves now. Just seems easier that way, plus I enjoy my milking routine and it lets me stay on top of anything that might be going on with my cows because I'm out there twice a day milking them.
