Possible to overfeed bottle babys? & Fencing

[hyp7]

I have two 9 day old bottle bull calves that I purchesed from a local farmer. One is doing great and one is doing better now. The smaller one looked to be maybe a day younger and I'm thinking we almost lost him, he had a fever, wouldnt eat , and looked to be going down hill real quick. Got some electrolytes in him and gave him an antibiotic shot from the vet. He is up jumping around and doing great and we started him back on the feeding routine, 2 quarts morning and 2 at night. They both seem still real hungry after they finish the bottle. Can I start giving them more like 2 1/2 or 3 quarts or more at each feeding or would that be to much. Or could you just feed till they got full? The bigger one ways 115lbs. and the smaller one ways around 98lbs. They have water,calf starter and good hay at all times but dont touch it at all. Sorry for the long winded post.
Thanks for the help.

 

[angie1]

Give only what your milk replacer bag suggests for them. Yes, you can over feed those babies ~ they all act starving after you pull the bottle out of thier mouth. Stick some grain in there instead, they will catch on fast. Glad to hear they are doing well!

 

[dun]

Bottle calve will try to con you into feeding them more then they need. They don't suck long enough from the bottle to get them past the suck anything point.

 

[TexasBred]

If they still act hungry put some luke warm water in the empty milk bottle and let them drink it. Wont' hurt them...but keep freshwater in fron to them too so they'll learn to drink on their own as well as a good high quality calf starter. They may not eat a thimble full a day but the sooner they get started the better.

 

[hyp7]

Any thoughts on a mineral block or some type of lick or loose mineral for the calves?
Also I will be building fence around a half acre would the wire panels and t-posts be good enough. There will only be the two calves and will have free choice hay and grain. This will be later on of course. Just thoughts on fencing.
Thanks for the responces you have helped more then you know.
Thanks again Gene

 

[dun]

Loose minerals is a good idea at any age. The cattle panel and t-post fence works well and allows felxibility in as much as it can be moved around by just adding to one part and removing some of the old part of the pen. In some areas we've put up cattle panel fences (replacing barbed) to keep baby calves from popping through the barbed and going wandering. Rather then fastening the ends of thr panels together in a permanent type of connection we just use a large dog snap that clips over the end upright part to hold them together

 

[shorty]

I train my calves to drink from a bucket before they are a week old , as they get bigger I gradually increase the water in their mix to 3 qts per feeding but I keep the amount of milk replacer the same . It seems to satisfy them a little better.








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[grubbie]

I seem to be out numbered here.....but; I have always given them what they will eat. If they want more, I will increase the feeding. With the medicated milk replacer I have seldom had trouble with scours. When I do, give them a bolus and they are generally off and running again. When the calves are that young I haven't had much luck getting them to take calf starter or grain, might just be me. Once they figure out what it is, (sometimes through force feeding) then I start backing off of the milk replacer. There certainly is an argument for less milk replacer as soon as you can though, if nothing else just for the cost. I guess my thinking is that momma cow will let him have what he wants, why shouldn't I do the same? Either way, good luck with your calf, as much of a pain a bottle calf can be, they are still quite a bit of fun to raise!

 

[backhoeboogie]

Putting a gentle weaned calf in with them seems to help on the hay. They tend to mimic what other cows do.

If they are straight bottle babies, follow the instructions on the replacer.

The grafted calves on my nurse cow get way more than they need but I don't want to milk so I just let them have it. They don't seem to suffer consequences but it is milk.

 

[TexasBred]

I seem to be out numbered here.....but; I have always given them what they will eat. If they want more, I will increase the feeding. With the medicated milk replacer I have seldom had trouble with scours. When I do, give them a bolus and they are generally off and running again. When the calves are that young I haven't had much luck getting them to take calf starter or grain, might just be me. Once they figure out what it is, (sometimes through force feeding) then I start backing off of the milk replacer. There certainly is an argument for less milk replacer as soon as you can though, if nothing else just for the cost. I guess my thinking is that momma cow will let him have what he wants, why shouldn't I do the same? Either way, good luck with your calf, as much of a pain a bottle calf can be, they are still quite a bit of fun to raise!

grubbie...this would work better if you could feed that baby small meals 15-20 times a day "like mama does". The twice a day slug feeding is what upsets the digestive process and scours a calf. Every time he gets the scours even if only for 24 hours puts the calf under stress and is a step backward. Adding extra water is something I've done in the past as well but never increased the milk replacer in the water. Keeps them hydrated and full.

 

[msscamp]

I seem to be out numbered here.....but; I have always given them what they will eat. If they want more, I will increase the feeding. With the medicated milk replacer I have seldom had trouble with scours. When I do, give them a bolus and they are generally off and running again. When the calves are that young I haven't had much luck getting them to take calf starter or grain, might just be me. Once they figure out what it is, (sometimes through force feeding) then I start backing off of the milk replacer. There certainly is an argument for less milk replacer as soon as you can though, if nothing else just for the cost. I guess my thinking is that momma cow will let him have what he wants, why shouldn't I do the same? Either way, good luck with your calf, as much of a pain a bottle calf can be, they are still quite a bit of fun to raise!

Well, then we are both outnumbered. I, too, feed them what they will eat - split into 3-4 feeding/day - until they are old enough/eating enough grain and hay to be full and satisfied. Isn't that how Mom does it? Must be a Wyoming thing, you're the only other person on these boards that I've seen that doesn't subscribe to the 2 quarts/2 times a day regime that the milk replacer companies recommend.

 

[msscamp]

grubbie...this would work better if you could feed that baby small meals 15-20 times a day "like mama does". The twice a day slug feeding is what upsets the digestive process and scours a calf. Every time he gets the scours even if only for 24 hours puts the calf under stress and is a step backward. Adding extra water is something I've done in the past as well but never increased the milk replacer in the water. Keeps them hydrated and full.

I'm not grubbie, but I agree with his thinking that they should have what they will eat, and I've yet to have a case of scours in my bottle calves. Common sense in increasing the milk goes a long ways to preventing scours. I feed my calves 4 or more times per day - depending on their age - and increase the milk by a pint at a time. Yes, it's a time comsumptive endeavor, but I've never had a case of scours and, since I started ignoring what the bag said, my calves do a whole lot better. Grain and good quality hay are provided from day one, too. If a calf is reluctant to eat the grain, I've also discovered that AS70 goes a long ways to getting him over his reluctance to eat that grain. I do not believe in bottle feeding water/nor watering down the milk replacer under any circumstances. Water is provided from day one, and they always figure out what it is there for. Watering down the milk replacer is cutting the calves out of needed nutrients, and I just don't see the point.

 

[regolith]

I've never seen problems from it myself, but my understanding was that feeding extra water with or immediately after the milk would interfere with the clotting/digestion process and risk scours. Seems an easy enough thing to not do, so I don't do it.

Some dairy farms out here feed the calves ad-lib or semi ad-lib - not feeding several times daily because no-one has time to do that, but just putting enough milk in front of them that they can come back to it as they wish. Biggest thing I don't like about that is that where I've seen it done, the calf rearers tend not to clean the milk feeders every day. Calves don't seem to mind, Holstein-Friesians will drink up to 10 litres daily, 7 litres for smaller breeds.

Just to add - the other thing I don't like about that system is that you can't monitor what each individual calf is drinking. If one doesn't come to feed when the milk is added, you don't know if she's sick, getting into solids and weaning herself off milk, or just had a good feed a few hours ago.

 

[TexasBred]

grubbie...this would work better if you could feed that baby small meals 15-20 times a day "like mama does". The twice a day slug feeding is what upsets the digestive process and scours a calf. Every time he gets the scours even if only for 24 hours puts the calf under stress and is a step backward. Adding extra water is something I've done in the past as well but never increased the milk replacer in the water. Keeps them hydrated and full.

I'm not grubbie, but I agree with his thinking that they should have what they will eat, and I've yet to have a case of scours in my bottle calves. Common sense in increasing the milk goes a long ways to preventing scours. I feed my calves 4 or more times per day - depending on their age - and increase the milk by a pint at a time. Yes, it's a time comsumptive endeavor, but I've never had a case of scours and, since I started ignoring what the bag said, my calves do a whole lot better. Grain and good quality hay are provided from day one, too. If a calf is reluctant to eat the grain, I've also discovered that AS70 goes a long ways to getting him over his reluctance to eat that grain. I do not believe in bottle feeding water/nor watering down the milk replacer under any circumstances. Water is provided from day one, and they always figure out what it is there for. Watering down the milk replacer is cutting the calves out of needed nutrients, and I just don't see the point.

msscamp, I would never water down the milk replacer either....however, simply adding water to a bottle when the calf has almost finished it doesn't water it down. He's already received 95% of his milk replacer and gets the other 5% in the water. The amount of powder remains the same regardless of the amount of water you mix it in...IF he consumes it all. The calf needs "x" amount of the powdered milk replacer per day. Diluting it hurts nothing as long as he gets that "x" amount of milk replacer....the multiple feedings probably benefit you more than anything and since you do the feeding yourself, nobody knows better than you what amount of milk replacer works best for each calf. Keep up the godo work. ;-)

 

[MoGal]

When we have to bottle a newborn calf, I usually start them out 2 pints at a time (some will take it 4 times a day, others won't), but by the time they get 7 to 10 days old, I'm giving them 4 pints (a full bottle) 3 x per day. When I first start out I add 1/2 tsp hydrogen peroxide to the bottle for a total of 1 tsp per day. ( I keep food grade hydrogen peroxide on hand, however I've also used the one from walmart that says it can be used to gargle with). This is for the first seven days. I researched it out and colostrum is high in h202 but its made naturally by the mother. I have found that we have very few scours and if a calf over 10 days old starts to scour then I add 1 tsp twice a day for a couple days and the calf straightens out. Maybe we've just been fortunate.

We've got two calves right now one born on Jan 1st and the heifer on Feb. 2nd and they have 3 bottles a day and eat 2/3 of a gallon ice cream container of grain daily. It would have been fantastic if the holsteins would have been calving now, but I never get that lucky.

It is expensive, but I prefer they grow out well and not have that pot belly.

 

[TMRwife]

Have our first bottle calf this year. It seems to me that the standard 2 qts/2 times a day is a little generic. Our calves range in weight from 65 to 95 lbs. Logic would suggest that a 95 lb calf would require more to eat than a 65 lb calf. I have been feeding 2 qts in the morning and 2-1/2 qts at night. I am sure this little bull calf would eat more if I offered it. He weighs approximately 80 lbs. We have put calf manna out for him, and I try to give him some of that with each feeding as well, though he has not acted interested in eating it himself. Any thoughts?

 

[regolith]

I see your other thread was answered correctly - the recommended feeding rate is usually for a Holstein calf.
I feed Jerseys at 2/3 the birth weight the same amount with no problems, but don't give them more than they want, if they're not hungry enough to drink it all.

As a rule of thumb give your calf 5% of his birth weight at each feed, if split into two feeds per day.

 

[TexasBred]

I see your other thread was answered correctly - the recommended feeding rate is usually for a Holstein calf.
I feed Jerseys at 2/3 the birth weight the same amount with no problems, but don't give them more than they want, if they're not hungry enough to drink it all.

As a rule of thumb give your calf 5% of his birth weight at each feed, if split into two feeds per day.

Read the feeding instructions on the bag and adjust accordingly. Most I believe give directions for a 90-100 lb. calf. Volume of water/milk replacer usually won't hurt...it's the concentration of the milk replacer in the daily water that scours.