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“Consensus recommendations on calf- and herd-level passive immunity in dairy calves in the United States.”Journal of Dairy Science, Vol. 103 No. 8, 2020.
The story of weaning and receiving calves is a familiar one across the country and it is soon upon us. As grass is drying up and fall has arrived it is time to formulate a plan for weaning.
Weaning is a challenging time for cattle and their owners. Our management decisions affect calves’ response to stress, which is a contributing factor to illness.
Over the last 10 years, the dairy industry has shown an increased interest in early life feeding programs for calves, spurred in part by several studies and meta-analyses illustrating the potential effect of greater pre-weaning average daily gain on future milk production.
With heifer raising accounting for roughly 20 percent of total farm expenses, paying close attention to heifer nutrition and management is essential for raising quality replacement animals without adding on unnecessary expenses.
Big data, said Ken Odde, is hard work. It takes time, organization and consistency.
But the empirical evidence that comes from cattle sale data reveals an accurate picture valuable to ranchers nationwide.
Weaning is quite possibly the most stressful time in a calf’s life. During this process, calves are subjected to a variety of stressors including removal from their mothers, new diets, processing (vaccination, dehorning, castration, etc.) and possibly even new pen or pasture environments.
Knowing which cattle to bring into the largest feeding company in the beef industry isn’t based on algorithms and vast caches of data, according to Tony Bryant, manager of research at Five Rivers Feeding.
In the cattle business, there are few things as rewarding as getting weaned calves and newly arrived feeder cattle off to a good start. The first 30–45 days after weaning and/or commingling can set the tone for calves’ lifelong health, performance and profitability. Whether calves are destined to be herd replacements or feeder cattle, they should all be provided with feed that helps them build strong immune systems and grow at a pace that will enhance their production for their entire lives.
