Using nurse cows?

[bigrob]

I'm thinking of getting a jersey nurse cow, I know there are a few threads on here about them but they seem to be limited. I'd like to get more information on it. What are some of y'alls experiences good or bad? What is the best approach, let the calves run loose with the cow, or use a milking pen/box and supervise? How much extra would you have to feed the cow for her to maintain condition? Would it be better to just let her raise her calf with a couple extra to weaning, or try to pull and replace every 3 months or so? Also how long do they dry up out of the year? I hear only 2-3 months, am I off by much?

 

[piedmontese]

i have a 3/4 x jersey and she would never dry up if i didnt do it for her.she makes me more $ than any other cow i got.i just sold her natural calf and the other 2 adopted calves for a total of $1,900. she now has 2 more on her and she will finish up with 1 or 2 more depending on condition/milk.i let her calves run with her fulltime but the trick is u have to have calves that are close n size and that will all compete for bag time.she has free choice hay and 10 lbs grain and mineral per day.she also gets barley once or twice per week,whenever i can get it from the brewers.shes a great cow and i know that they r not all like her.the 3 calves that i just sold were 2 adopted holsteins,and her natural calf that was sired by a piedmontese bull and all black n color.he weighed 535 lbs and sold for $1.70 per lb.the holsteins weighed 500 and sold for $1.08.

 

[randiliana]

We have a Holstein. She raises us 2-3 calves a year, I know she could probably do more, but we don't have time for that. The best way to adopt is to have the calf/s that you want to adopt onto her ready when she calves. Last year it worked out great. The adoptee calf was born about 3 hours before she calved. All we did was put him in with her right before she calved, tied his legs up and that was it.... Usually, we hobble her for about a week with her calves then she is good. She is a excellent cow! We don't grain her, but she is grazing on our best pasture for the year. She winters with the bred heifers.

 

[HOSS]

I have a full jersey nurse cow. The way I work it is she is bred a bit earlier than the rest of my herd. She calves first and is ready to take another calf if something happen like a cow dies giving birth or abandons her calf (thank goodness this does not happen often). If my nurse cow is not needed for surragate mother duty we buy a bottle calf or two from a local dairy. She raises the calves and we sell the dairy calves at weaning and if her calf is a steer we keep it for the freezer. Last years steer has really good beef. Something about that Gelbvieh x Jersey really produces some good meat. We give her a few months off and re-breed. She will take any calf and is as gentle as a puppy. She always gets bred on the first service and does a nice job of being a momma.

 

[Tim/South]

My son came home from the sale with 3 young beef calves one time. I was going to bottle raise them but those never seem to grow off as well as I like.
I know a guy that owns a dairy. He will sell me his cull cows (split udder where the tendons stretch out and the "faucets" turn out to the side) for $350 - $400.
I bought a cow from him. The cow had never nursed a calf and was in culture shock the first time. She got sore and had to toughen up down there. Kind of felt sorry for her the first week.
She loved those babies. I would pen the calves at night, nurse them first thing in the morning, then turn them out together in a small pasture close to the barn.
Then my son came home with another 3. Bought another cow. She was not as tolerant as the first. I made some stocks and contained her so the calves could nurse.
I would still pen the calves at night, then turn the younger ones out first in the morning. Once their sides began to swell out I would turn the other older calves out.
After about two weeks I left them all out and together.
Raised 7 nice calves on two cows.
I had friends tell me I might be on to something. My concern was that I would not be able to find affordable calves. I did have to raise some Jersey calves from time to time.
Here is a picture of the first Momma. She was a great. Her udder finally stretched so low that nothing could nurse her.
http://www.horsegroomingsupplies.com/pi ... erby=views

 

[bigrob]

Thanks for the info guys! I've also thought about gettin one that is crossbred. Do you think they will still produce enough milk to raise possibly 2 more calves? I'm thinking crossed because when I breed her back to a beef breed for a meat calf I'll get more bang for my buck (for lack of a better term lol). I thought it would be unhealthy for them to be continuously lactating, I was under the impression they needed a dry period to recondition.

 

[backhoeboogie]

I've got a jersey holstein cross at the moment. Occasionally I put one of my own on her if something goes amiss. Generally buying beef splits from the sale barn and grafting them onto her fetches the most nickels.

I will attach a pic of the crate I have built (if it works). In this pic I was stripping clostrums. A couple of coffee cans on sweet feed is all it takes. She is waiting to get into the crate at feeding time. After the calves have nursed for three days or so, they have her scent and she accepts them. When they are turned out to pasture she only has 3 calves on her. If she was continually crated she could handle 4 new borns. You can split one off later to ensure there is enough to go around.

One trick to grafting without a crate is to get a sponge bucket and sponge the cows milk onto the calf you are attempting to graft. Lightly sponge her milk on to the calf, let it dry and it will smell normal to her - sometimes.

http://ranchers.net/photopost/showphoto ... puser/2144

 

[randiliana]

Depends on the cow. We have a Holstein/Angus cow that raises a decent calf of her own. But nothing special. I don't think she'd raise much more than that, I just don't think she could raise 2 without special attention. OTOH I have our nurse cow's daughter (Holstein/Angus) who will calve this year and I am hoping she will raise a couple. We will see when she calves.

 

[bigrob]

I've got a jersey holstein cross at the moment. Occasionally I put one of my own on her if something goes amiss. Generally buying beef splits from the sale barn and grafting them onto her fetches the most nickels.

I will attach a pic of the crate I have built (if it works). In this pic I was stripping clostrums. A couple of coffee cans on sweet feed is all it takes. She is waiting to get into the crate at feeding time. After the calves have nursed for three days or so, they have her scent and she accepts them. When they are turned out to pasture she only has 3 calves on her. If she was continually crated she could handle 4 new borns. You can split one off later to ensure there is enough to go around.

One trick to grafting without a crate is to get a sponge bucket and sponge the cows milk onto the calf you are attempting to graft. Lightly sponge her milk on to the calf, let it dry and it will smell normal to her - sometimes.

http://ranchers.net/photopost/showphoto ... puser/2144

That is what I had in mind to build myself. About how much on average do you pay for the beef calves?

 

[bigrob]

Depends on the cow. We have a Holstein/Angus cow that raises a decent calf of her own. But nothing special. I don't think she'd raise much more than that, I just don't think she could raise 2 without special attention. OTOH I have our nurse cow's daughter (Holstein/Angus) who will calve this year and I am hoping she will raise a couple. We will see when she calves.

So it's kind of a crap shoot on whether or not you'll get a heavy milking cow? What if I were to find a 3/4 bred jersey? Or maybe a Holstein cross instead?

 

[backhoeboogie]

That is what I had in mind to build myself. About how much on average do you pay for the beef calves?

The last ones were right at $200 and I still made a lot of nickels on them. I hated paying that much but did not have the time to go to several auctions and did not want to milk a cow out twice a day.

There's a cow in the herd, #40, is pretty much straight angus but does okay if she calves in the fall or winter. At the time she was bought, I was done buying. They split her off and no one bid. She did not have any ear which is a bad thing here for females. They dropped to $40 and I took her. It turned out okay and she has had 5 calves for me now. Anyway, that price was unusually low.

If someone calls me with an orphan calf I generally just pay what they ask. They don't want to bottle feed for a few days waiting on an auction. Folks are reasonable if they know you. Haven't bought one like that in quite some time tho.

 

[I luv herfrds]

My Jersey cow raised 2 calves this last year and provided enough milk for my family and a few more. I fed the living crap out of her to keep her condition up. I had a third calf I was going to try to put on her but the calfs dam broke his neck.
I would cut the calves off at night, milk her in the morning then turn the calves loose on her while she was cleaning up her feed. Then I kicked them out to the pasture. We kept back the grafted calf.

 

[bigrob]

i have a 3/4 x jersey and she would never dry up if i didnt do it for her.she makes me more $ than any other cow i got.i just sold her natural calf and the other 2 adopted calves for a total of $1,900. she now has 2 more on her and she will finish up with 1 or 2 more depending on condition/milk.i let her calves run with her fulltime but the trick is u have to have calves that are close n size and that will all compete for bag time.she has free choice hay and 10 lbs grain and mineral per day.she also gets barley once or twice per week,whenever i can get it from the brewers.shes a great cow and i know that they r not all like her.the 3 calves that i just sold were 2 adopted holsteins,and her natural calf that was sired by a piedmontese bull and all black n color.he weighed 535 lbs and sold for $1.70 per lb.the holsteins weighed 500 and sold for $1.08.

This is what I'm planning on doing more or less. I figure it would be easier to care for 1 or 2 cows raising 6-8 calves than 6-8 cows raising one at a time. I am planning to have all my calves within 2 weeks of each other to cut back on the size/ bullying thing. That's why I was wanting to pull them every 3 months and replace with new calves. Then try to feed out the older ones a little more and sell around 450-500 lbs. Is this pretty much what you do? How do the Piedmontese bulls do for you? I think they are double muscled, is that correct?

 

[bigrob]

My son came home from the sale with 3 young beef calves one time. I was going to bottle raise them but those never seem to grow off as well as I like.
I know a guy that owns a dairy. He will sell me his cull cows (split udder where the tendons stretch out and the "faucets" turn out to the side) for $350 - $400.
I bought a cow from him. The cow had never nursed a calf and was in culture shock the first time. She got sore and had to toughen up down there. Kind of felt sorry for her the first week.
She loved those babies. I would pen the calves at night, nurse them first thing in the morning, then turn them out together in a small pasture close to the barn.
Then my son came home with another 3. Bought another cow. She was not as tolerant as the first. I made some stocks and contained her so the calves could nurse.
I would still pen the calves at night, then turn the younger ones out first in the morning. Once their sides began to swell out I would turn the other older calves out.
After about two weeks I left them all out and together.
Raised 7 nice calves on two cows.
I had friends tell me I might be on to something. My concern was that I would not be able to find affordable calves. I did have to raise some Jersey calves from time to time.
Here is a picture of the first Momma. She was a great. Her udder finally stretched so low that nothing could nurse her.
http://www.horsegroomingsupplies.com/pi ... erby=views

Thanks for the info. That's basically what I want to do with one. I only know of a couple dairies anywhere close to me to get calves from. I probably need to talk to them to see when they have steers available so I can plan around that for extra calves if I can't get any from the sale barn. Is it very hard to get heifer calves off of them?

 

[bigrob]

My Jersey cow raised 2 calves this last year and provided enough milk for my family and a few more. I fed the living crap out of her to keep her condition up. I had a third calf I was going to try to put on her but the calfs dam broke his neck.
I would cut the calves off at night, milk her in the morning then turn the calves loose on her while she was cleaning up her feed. Then I kicked them out to the pasture. We kept back the grafted calf.

Thanks, I have thought about milking too but I don't really see the need. I was planning on maybe doing that later when I don't have such long work days.

 

[bigrob]

That is what I had in mind to build myself. About how much on average do you pay for the beef calves?

The last ones were right at $200 and I still made a lot of nickels on them. I hated paying that much but did not have the time to go to several auctions and did not want to milk a cow out twice a day.

There's a cow in the herd, #40, is pretty much straight angus but does okay if she calves in the fall or winter. At the time she was bought, I was done buying. They split her off and no one bid. She did not have any ear which is a bad thing here for females. They dropped to $40 and I took her. It turned out okay and she has had 5 calves for me now. Anyway, that price was unusually low.
If someone calls me with an orphan calf I generally just pay what they ask. They don't want to bottle feed for a few days waiting on an auction. Folks are reasonable if they know you. Haven't bought one like that in quite some time tho.

I figured on having to pay around $100-$150 or so a head for them. I'll probably put an ad out for day old calves thats just the term everyone around here uses for bottle calves no matter their age. a out how much did your milking cage cost to build?

 

[chippie]

Yes, you should dry the cow a month or so before she calves so she can rest.
Plus you do not want the grafted calves nursing the colostrum before she has her own calf.

A dairy cow will put all of her energy (grass, hay, grain) into making milk, so you need to monitor her condition to make sure that she is getting adequate nutrition to feed the calves. Now I am not saying that anyone here does this, but I've seen nurse cows that were not treated well and they just about starved to death trying to feed 3 calves. The owner ruined them.

 

[bigrob]

Yes, you should dry the cow a month or so before she calves so she can rest.
Plus you do not want the grafted calves nursing the colostrum before she has her own calf.

A dairy cow will put all of her energy (grass, hay, grain) into making milk, so you need to monitor her condition to make sure that she is getting adequate nutrition to feed the calves. Now I am not saying that anyone here does this, but I've seen nurse cows that were not treated well and they just about starved to death trying to feed 3 calves. The owner ruined them.

I plan on feeding her very well, I just don't know what would be the best for her or possibly mixi g my own of several different ones. After all she will be working extremely hard so she should be "pampered" lol. I was thinking of drying her for a couple months. Would that be better, or is just one month plenty? I want to have her for awhile and eventually get up to 5 so I'm very interested in doing it right and good, that's just my personality lol

 

[backhoeboogie]

That is what I had in mind to build myself. About how much on average do you pay for the beef calves?

The last ones were right at $200 and I still made a lot of nickels on them. I hated paying that much but did not have the time to go to several auctions and did not want to milk a cow out twice a day.

There's a cow in the herd, #40, is pretty much straight angus but does okay if she calves in the fall or winter. At the time she was bought, I was done buying. They split her off and no one bid. She did not have any ear which is a bad thing here for females. They dropped to $40 and I took her. It turned out okay and she has had 5 calves for me now. Anyway, that price was unusually low.
If someone calls me with an orphan calf I generally just pay what they ask. They don't want to bottle feed for a few days waiting on an auction. Folks are reasonable if they know you. Haven't bought one like that in quite some time tho.

I figured on having to pay around $100-$150 or so a head for them. I'll probably put an ad out for day old calves thats just the term everyone around here uses for bottle calves no matter their age. a out how much did your milking cage cost to build?

I am thinking it was around $60 to build that crate but don't really remember. Hinge pieces and base pieces were short iron junk from the junk pile. The galvanized Unistrut on the based came from a salvage auction at 7 cents a foot (couldn't believe I got it for that). I bought some of the tube steel and used bent wire cattle panels. I was at TSC in Weatherford for something or another and had the flat bed. There were about a dozen cull panels. I asked them what they were going to do with them and they said, "Somebody will give us $8 a piece for them." I said, "Load 'em." Bought all of them. If you are welding them to tube steel gates or devices such as this, the damage is insignificant. Some of them were so mildly damaged that they were straightened perfectly with hickey bars.

 

[bigrob]

Thanks backhoe. I work in the oilfield currently and I can pick up scrap pieces for free just for asking and that's what I was gonna use. I really appreciate the information you have been giving me. I know I ask alot of questions lol, but I figure how else are you going to learn anything? What kind of feed and mineral would you recommend for a nurse cow?