yoghurt powder in electrolyte?

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regolith

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Is there any reason not to routinely add yoghurt powder to an electrolyte mix?

I've been doing it for the last couple of days, not my normal practise but two calves that had recovered from scours about a week before started scouring again suddenly - real nasty blood + water, and thinking that the previous bout of scours might have stripped out some good bugs I gave each a tablespoon of yoghurt powder a few hours after the electrolyte, then started mixing it with the electrolyte at two tablespoons to 2 litres.
Just thought that maybe if it's going to be helpful and add some flavouring and doesn't do any harm I should always add it to mix. I used one packet (that makes up to a litre of yoghurt) in 24 hours for two calves.

The rotavirus vaccine was effective for the main group of calves born but there wasn't the "lack of scours in older calves reduces infection risk to the younger ones" effect that I was counting on because every calf born later than the first 6 - 7 weeks of calving has suffered scours. It looks like next year I'll need to cut out later calvers to vaccinate separately, at a later date.
 
My wife uses powdered cultured buttermilk. I would think the desired result would be the same, although we haven't used it enough with cattle to offer an opinion. My wife got this recipe from an elderly lady a few years ago, and started using it on orphaned baby goats (or mostly when a doe has 3 or 4 kids). Since then, people give her goats because she is very successful saving them.
I don't have her recipe, and wouldn't have a clue about how to compare it to the yogurt, nor would I know the benefit potential. If you want her recipe, let me know, and I'll ask her in the morning
 
Hi ouachita

be keen to know of other mixes if you want to share... I sometimes wonder if I'm doing the right thing home-mixing but the calves recover fast and it's much more practical. Since rotavirus came along it seems I need to deal with scours in a mob at a time, not one calf at a time.
 
Okay she just handed me the recipe. Although after some discussion, it's not necessarily for scours. More to get the gut jump started. I'll type the recipe as it was written by the elderly lady in her own hand writing, exactly;

Gallon raw milk
can evapo milk
1 big egg
1 cup powderd butter milk

mix gallon milk w evapo milk
then mix egg w powerd butted milk
and pour into milk mix
mix until the powdered buttered milk is desolvd
warm
pour in botle and fed

Okay, now my wife any myself have used variations of this cultured powdered buttermilk. She has save many orphaned goats with the above recipe. We have only used it on a half dozen baby calfs that she brought home from the sale. None died. We have also used this powdered buttermilk mixed with electolite for scours (no milk) with success. I cannot grade success on the handful of animals that we have treated this way, but I can say with and without other measures of treatment, none died. We have only lost animals to physical trama/defect, and dogs. Some where on this forum I posted a topic about a calf we had in May (I think it was May) that was born with poor use of back legs. It could only stand to nurse for brief periods. Many times I would hold it to nurse. We did the vet thing and got selenium, vitamin E, and etc. It became obvious after 3 weeks this calf had some neurological problem. The bigger it got, the less it was able to move. Little gal did gain about 25 pounds in the 3 weeks we worked with her, but we decided to do the right thing.
 
Rotavirus shouldn't present with blood - it causes villous atrophy, not mucosal necrosis - in other words, the only thing that's seriously damaged in rotaviral diarrhea is the absorptive capacity. Have you had lab work done to confirm the cause of the diarrhea? you may have rotavirus + a bacterial cause, e.g. salmonella, but I suspect you have more than just rotavirus.
 
I've used yogurt in both MR and electrolyte mixes with real good results, but I've never used it powdered.
I didn't know that the cultures are still active. I'm going to look into that more over here.
 
Milkmaid: the scours recurred in these two calves. My guess was that the initial attack was rotavirus and that it had weakened them enough to make them susceptible to another bug after they seemed fully recovered. I've noticed the calves appear to acquire immunity after a case and the lack of scours in the earlier calves (protected by their vaccinated dams) is enough for me to believe the main problem is rotavirus. Last year every single calf I reared scoured, this year only the younger ones.
Salmonella is possible. I didn't manage to save that one, she quickly deteriorated into a coma. The other one scouring water but no blood is out on grass with older calves now.
Sent samples in last year from the worst two calves in a mob, one came back negative for everything the other positive to rota and crypto.

Cottagefarm - according to the label cultures are active, they have to be or it wouldn't make yoghurt when reconstituted. Some carton 'yoghurts' you can buy aren't because they've been pasteurised or are just a flavoured dairyfood for the children's market, so you do need to check. At one time I did think you could just get a carton of natural yoghurt off the supermarket shelf and use it to start a batch of yoghurt for calves... not always the case.

ouachita, the one that made it I defrosted colostrum from the freezer for the first couple of feeds after I thought she was ready for milk. Your recipe might break down into similar nutritional value to colostrum. How much would you feed a calf at a time, 1/2 - 2/3 their normal feed I'd guess?
 
My darlin companion is still sleeping, so I'll wing it. The bottle is 2 quarts I believe. I've seen her and the kids carry it out half full for day or three old calves. I've also sen her come back empty and refill. Like I say, we've only raised up a few calves, so I'm (we) are not experts. Just thought I'd pass along a recipe from a lady who has alot more experience in life than me.
 

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