How Early?

[TomW]

We just adopted a calf that lost its mother during birth. We are bottle feeding but I need to know what is the earliest we can put her on grain? I think I read somewhere it can not be too early or there could be problems. She weighs about 90 lbs right now -was 50-60 at birth she was early. She seems to be gaining fine and is now about 3 weeks old.
thanks in advance
tom

 

[Alice]

Introduce starter grower/calf manna to the calf now. We put this out just for the calves to start sniffing and maybe licking on when they are 3 days old. Three weeks old is definitely not too early. This doesn't mean, however that you should discontinue the bottle feedings.

You made it past the 2 week old mark, good for you. Things should go well, unless something unforeseen crops up.

Alice

 

[GMN]

We just adopted a calf that lost its mother during birth. We are bottle feeding but I need to know what is the earliest we can put her on grain? I think I read somewhere it can not be too early or there could be problems. She weighs about 90 lbs right now -was 50-60 at birth she was early. She seems to be gaining fine and is now about 3 weeks old.
thanks in advance
tom

Three weeks old is a great time to introduce grain, no sooner in my mind, 3 days old is just plain foolish to feed a baby calf grain, they are still on colustrum at this age. Feed a high quality calf starter grain with bovatec, 17% at least.

GMN

 

[dun]

This is were you get into differences of methods and opinions. We alwasy introduce grain during the first week. They may not be able to utilize it but it gives them something to do. But we also have water in front of them from the beginning and put out a ittle hay by the time they're a week old.
If they were out with their mommas they'ld be eating hay and whatever else was available by the time they're a week old. Usually they're chewing their cud by 10 days and no latter then 2 weeks. They probably aren;t getting anything out of it, but they're doing it.

 

[GMN]

This is were you get into differences of methods and opinions. We alwasy introduce grain during the first week. They may not be able to utilize it but it gives them something to do. But we also have water in front of them from the beginning and put out a ittle hay by the time they're a week old.
If they were out with their mommas they'ld be eating hay and whatever else was available by the time they're a week old. Usually they're chewing their cud by 10 days and no latter then 2 weeks. They probably aren;t getting anything out of it, but they're doing it.

I have talked to several very experienced dairy farmers about this topic, and they have never heard of feeding a 3 day old calf grain or hay, they are just babies, these are holstein dairy calves, even if they were with their moms, they would not be eating grain, they would be driinking moms milk, just more of it, and whenever they wanted. Baby holstein calves 3 days old, are still being fed colustrum, which we feed colustrum at least for a week, then either cows milk or milk replacer. We do not even introduce grain until at least 2 weeks of age, and hay not until they are much older.

GMN

 

[dun]

This is were you get into differences of methods and opinions. We alwasy introduce grain during the first week. They may not be able to utilize it but it gives them something to do. But we also have water in front of them from the beginning and put out a ittle hay by the time they're a week old.
If they were out with their mommas they'ld be eating hay and whatever else was available by the time they're a week old. Usually they're chewing their cud by 10 days and no latter then 2 weeks. They probably aren;t getting anything out of it, but they're doing it.

I have talked to several very experienced dairy farmers about this topic, and they have never heard of feeding a 3 day old calf grain or hay, they are just babies, these are holstein dairy calves, even if they were with their moms, they would not be eating grain, they would be driinking moms milk, just more of it, and whenever they wanted. Baby holstein calves 3 days old, are still being fed colustrum, which we feed colustrum at least for a week, then either cows milk or milk replacer. We do not even introduce grain until at least 2 weeks of age, and hay not until they are much older.

GMN

That's one of the differences between raising a calf at a dairy and raising any calf not on a dairy. The majority of calves that leave a dairy are only a day to a couple of days old and I'll wager they don;t get colostrum after they leave the dairy.
Different methods for different situations.

dun

 

[cbattaglia38]

dun and alice has never steered me wrong. i back them up 100%. They gave me the same advice just a couple of weeks ago and my calf is doing great!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[BlackBaldyMan]

We introduce it right away in a creep feeder so its up to them when they want to start