Feeding and caring for calves in the first year of life

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Calves are quite demanding animals to care for. Particular attention should be paid to feeding these cattle. Feeding calves should be balanced and properly selected in accordance with age, otherwise the animals will grow slowly, and poor nutrition will not affect the health condition in the best way.

Feeding and caring for calves from the first months

Feeding newborn calves

During this period, you will not have to ask special questions about nutrition, since the cow is breastfeeding the newborn. But this process cannot be left to chance either. The milk that a cow gives immediately after calving and for the next 6 days is called colostrum. It is very important that in the first hours of life the calf eats colostrum, the composition of which is significantly different from that of normal milk. The main difference is that colostrum contains maternal antibodies, which the calf needs to form immunity and protect against disease-causing bacteria. As for the content of other elements, vitamin A, for example, in colostrum is 100 times more than in milk.

It should be ensured that the newborn animal eats about 1 kg of colostrum immediately after birth. Over the next day, it will not be superfluous to give colostrum in addition to mother's milk. But it is worth knowing that all the beneficial components contained in colostrum are best absorbed during the first few hours after birth.

For the first 10 days, you should not adhere to any specific feeding schedule. The calf should be milked as needed. Do not limit portions either. The animal will not drink more than it needs. As a rule, the daily norm of milk during this period is 8 liters. During the first week, the newborn is fed at least 5 times a day.

Colostrum can be frozen: after defrosting, it does not lose its properties and does not change in composition.

Cooking colostrum yourself

If for some reason the cow does not give colostrum, you can cook it yourself. True, this product will not be as useful as natural colostrum obtained from a cow. To prepare it, take 4 chicken eggs, 15 and 10 g of fish oil and salt, respectively, 1 liter of cow's milk. All ingredients are placed in a container and mixed until smooth. In the finished mixture, the salt should be completely dispersed.

It is necessary to feed newborns with homemade colostrum half an hour before taking the main food, which is fresh cow's milk. Give no more than 300 g of homemade colostrum at a time.

The first changes in the diet

The first changes in calf feeding occur on the 10th day.During this period, cattle are transferred to 3 meals a day. In addition to milk, which animals independently drink from a bucket, semolina is introduced into their diet. To prepare porridge, you need 4 tbsp. l. semolina and 3 liters of cow's milk. Also, hay and starter compound feed are introduced into the diet. All new foods are introduced into the diet gradually, observing the reaction of the animal to new foods.

Nutrition also plays an important role in the diet. Milk alone, although liquid, is not enough. Be sure to give newborns water. Do not leave a container of water in the shed. The calf should be watered 120 minutes after eating. The water is preheated to room temperature. It is enough to give 1 liter of water at a time, although it is impractical to limit the drinking regime.

After 3 weeks, there should be liquid with preheated water in the shed. The water temperature should exceed 12 degrees Celsius.

Oatmeal jelly

In addition to milk, it is advisable to include oatmeal jelly in the diet during the first month of life. To prepare it, you will need 1 liter of water and 80 g of oatmeal. Heat the water to a boil, pour the flakes with it, close the container with a lid and leave the flakes to infuse for 10-15 minutes.

The daily norm of this drink for animals, whose age varies from 10 to 16 days of life, averages 200 g. From 16 to 19 days, 400 g of the drink are given to the calves. Over the next 2 days, the dose is increased by another 200 g. From 21 to 25 days, 700 g of the drink is given per day. From day 25 to one month old, they give 900 g of oatmeal jelly per day. The next 2 days increase the daily ration of the drink by 300 g. On the 32nd day we give 1800 g of jelly. From the 36th to the 60th day, we give 2400 g of drink per day. When the animals reach 2 months of age, the jelly is replaced with concentrates.

Monthly Calf Diet

The following changes in diet occur after 30 days of life. Let's figure out what to give to a month-old calf. During this period, the diet is enriched with juicy forages, for the preparation of which vegetables and fruits are added to the hay. First of all, potato peels, carrots and beets are introduced into the diet. All vegetables are chopped. You can also add apple peeling to the hay.

They carefully monitor the quality of the feed. Do not give the animals leftovers that have soured and have already begun to be covered with moss. Poor nutrition leads to various indigestion, which will subsequently negatively affect the state of health. In some cases, such negligence can lead to the death of the animal.

In addition to the basic nutrition, the calves need to be given additional feeding, which will provide the body with trace elements and vitamins necessary for normal functioning. Similar dressings are on sale. You should buy only high-quality supplements that have a fairly high price. You can do the feeding yourself. At the age of one month, the body of the calf needs calcium, phosphorus, vitamins of groups A, D and E. To prepare the feeding, you will need meat and bone meal, salt and chalk. All 3 components are taken in equal proportions. One-time feeding rate is at least 30 g.

Also, at the age of one month, reverse is added. In this case, one animal should drink an average of 5 liters of skimmed milk per day. You can replace the reverse with milk, diluted decoction of horse sorrel and St. John's wort. Milk is diluted in a 2: 1 ratio. In addition to skimmed milk, at 2 months of age, calves begin to feed oats and other grain crops.

We figured out how to feed a calf at 1 month old. At the same time, feeding calves up to 3 months is not significantly different, and the next change in diet occurs at 3 months of age.

Diet for a 3 month old calf

The period of life that begins when the calf reaches 3 months of age is called the post-milk period. Already by the name of this period, one can guess that at this stage milk is practically excluded from the diet.Accordingly, it must be replaced by some other type of feed. This feed is a concentrate made from bran, cake and cereals. You can cook such food at home, or you can buy ready-made ones.

When buying compound feed, you should carefully study its composition. They give preference to compound feeds enriched with mineral additives and vitamins. It is cheaper to prepare compound feed at home. But, in addition to compound feed, you will have to additionally give mineral supplements in the form of meat and bone meal, chalk and salt. At the same time, you should not abuse mineral supplements: their surplus will not benefit either a newborn calf or adults.

If this period of growth fell on the summer months, then green fodder will be an excellent alternative to compound feed. At the beginning of the post-milk period, no more than 2 kg of green fodder is given per day. At this stage, milk is not yet removed, but only its amount is reduced. Gradually increase the dose of green food and, accordingly, reduce the milk rate. So, at the age of 4 months, a calf should receive an average of 11 kg of green feed per day. At the end of the post-milk period, the calf is given 18-20 kg of green forage per day.

For some heifers, hunting begins as early as the 6th month of life, therefore, during this period, heifers need to be grazed separately from bulls, if there are any in the herd.

Diet of calves that have reached 6 months of age

Feeding calves from 6 months does not differ significantly from feeding after 3 months. When the animals reach the age of 6 months, they talk about the onset of a period of active growth. The purpose of feeding calves of this age is to gain weight. If animals do not receive enough food, they will not gain even the average weight for their breed.

As a rule, this period falls in the winter. Accordingly, it is not possible to feed cattle with green fodder. The winter diet consists of compound feed, meadow hay and root crops. Serving weight should be appropriate for the age of the animal. So, for example, at the beginning of the period of active growth, animals are given 3 kg of meadow hay and root crops, 1.5 kg of feed. This is the daily allowance for one calf. Already for 12 months, the daily norm consists of 7 kg of root crops, 3 kg of meadow hay and 1 kg of compound feed. In addition to basic feed, we give animals water and mineral supplements.

Calf care

The calf care is not limited to feeding. You need to monitor the livestock from the first minute of livestock life.

Calf birth

During calving, the cow needs to be close to the woman in labor. She is not always able to give birth herself. If in 40 minutes the calf does not come into the world, you need to help him. It is advisable that this assistance be provided by a specialist who will carefully pull the calf out by the front legs and head. It is extremely difficult to independently perform this procedure without harming either the woman in labor or the newborn calf. If there is no veterinarian nearby and you have to help the cow to give birth, then the calf should be pulled at those moments when the cow is pushing.

After birth, the umbilical cord is cut from the calf. In this case, you need to use previously disinfected scissors. The edge of the umbilical cord should be filled with iodine, after squeezing out the remaining blood from it. The calf is then placed next to the cow to lick it. The rough tongue of the woman in labor massages the skin of the newborn, increasing blood circulation. This helps keep the calf warm. If the cow refuses to lick the calf after birth, mucus should be removed from its body with burlap.

At the end of all the above measures, the newborn calf is placed in a previously prepared cage. The preliminary preparation of the cell means its disinfection. The floor should be covered with a thick layer of clean, fresh straw. The barn should be at least 12 ° C. It is better that the temperature is 15-16 ° C.A feature of newborn calves is that they need very little time after birth to acclimatize. Already after 6 hours they are perfectly on their feet.

Caring for calves in the first months of life

So that there are no problems with newborn calves, they need to be accustomed to the regimen from the first weeks. Food is given at the same time, otherwise the animals will eat poorly. Sometimes the lack of a regime leads to overeating, which negatively affects the health of the livestock.

For the first two weeks, young animals should be kept in separate cages. The temperature in the barn should not drop below 13-15 ° C. All liquid foods are given warm (35-36 ° C). Only after reaching one month of age, the calves are transferred to the common barn, where they are kept in cages in groups. At the same time, young animals at this age are not added to adult gobies and cows. Gobies and heifers up to 6 months can be kept together.

A two month old calf is less whimsical than a one month old. At this age, it can already be grazed with adult cows, but the composition of the compound feed and food additives differs from the composition of the compound feed for adults, therefore, the nutrition must be carefully monitored. An improperly selected diet in the future will negatively affect the milk and meat productivity of cattle.

When raising calves, it is most important to keep the cages clean. It is systematically necessary to do pest control of the barn, ventilate the room.

Calf health

Subject to all standards of keeping and feeding, calves rarely get sick. If we talk about the most common diseases, then a newly born calf most often suffers from:

• gastrointestinal diseases;
• dysplasia;
• peritonitis;

Consider the symptoms of these diseases and how to treat them.

Dyspepsia

This disease, which is popularly called indigestion, is the most common problem for farmers. There are many reasons for this disease. If, for example, an animal drinks too quickly, dyspepsia may occur. Also, the disease occurs due to the intake of too cold or too hot food, when using sour fermented milk products, with a sharp change in the diet.

Symptoms of dyspepsia, which is a gastrointestinal disorder, are poor appetite and indigestion. With the development of the disease in the calf, the eyes begin to sink and the appearance of the coat deteriorates. At the same time, the animal breathes heavily and often.

To treat a calf at home for this disease, you need a saline solution, for the preparation of which you will need 10 g of table salt and 1 liter of water. Drink is given warm. In addition to the saline solution, the animal is not offered anything.

Constipation

Another gastrointestinal disease that farmers most often encounter when feeding 1-2 month old calves. Symptoms of constipation are general lethargy, bloated abdomen. Immediately after bloating, reduce the amount of milk given. To cleanse the stomach, feed the calf with castor oil (no more than 150 g). You can also rub the belly with turpentine.

Dysplasia

Dysplasia is an underdevelopment of the joints. This disease is most often found in representatives of meat breeds. Until the end, the causes of the appearance of the disease have not been investigated by scientists, but it has been proven that a lack of minerals in the first weeks of life and improper maintenance provoke this disease. It has also been proven that dysplasia is inherited. This fact must be taken into account when conducting breeding work.

It is extremely difficult to diagnose the disease in a month-old calf. It manifests itself in three-month-old young animals and at a later age. At first, the animal begins to walk poorly, over time it falls to its feet. The diagnosis can be made after X-ray examinations, although at home it is possible to determine the disease with an accuracy of 98%.Unfortunately, methods of treatment of this disease of the musculoskeletal system have not been developed to date.

Peritonitis

Peritonitis is inflammation of the peritoneum. This disease is quite painful, often the animal screams in pain. Peritonitis is a consequence of a neglected disease of the abdominal cavity (volvulus, gastroenteritis, ulcer, etc.).

The symptoms of peritonitis are high body temperature, general lethargy, and decreased appetite. The animal has a short and restless sleep, during walks it hunches down, the stomach sags. Before starting treatment, you should consult a doctor: only a specialist will correctly diagnose. Treatment involves the use of antibiotics and sometimes surgery.

Prophylaxis

First of all, it is worth noting that the health of the calf depends on the health of the cow that bore it, therefore, during pregnancy, the cow should be provided with proper housing conditions and monitor her nutrition. Also, the conditions of detention directly affect the health of young animals. Animals do not tolerate frosts and drafts. The litter in the calf shed should be made of dry hay. It is advisable to change it every day. Calves need to be bathed and taken for walks from the age of one month.

In addition to compliance with maintenance standards, vaccination is carried out. Already on the 10th day, a vaccine against viral diarrhea is given. After 21 days, revaccination is carried out. After the 12th day, calves are vaccinated against viral diseases, and at the age of one month they are vaccinated against infectious diseases.

All vaccinations are given according to the scheme. It is important to vaccinate an absolutely healthy animal. The vaccination schedule will be written by a veterinarian, depending on the specifics of the breed of cattle.

Also, a preventive measure is a systematic examination of the livestock. At the slightest ailment (the calf fell and does not get up or shakes in its sleep, for example), you need to call the veterinarian or at least show a photo of the animal if there are visible changes. In any case, no specialist will be able to accurately diagnose from the photo: only after the examination will the veterinarian make a diagnosis and prescribe the appropriate treatment.

Conclusion

Raising calves is a painstaking and complex process. The diet of cattle must be carefully monitored from the first days of life. At each stage of growth, feed must be carefully selected. So, for example, feeding a calf at the age of 3 months is different from the diet of a monthly calf. Particular care should be taken when choosing a diet for a newborn calf.

The diet of a bull and a heifer may vary slightly. Also, the cattle breed, the purpose of the content and its orientation affect the compilation of the nutrition scheme. Meat breeds, for example, are kept for quality beef. How much feed to feed the calves depends on their age and weight. Recommended doses are indicated on the packages with compound feed.