We have a orphan calve and we are now raising it. I'd like to know what kind of milk helps replace all the nutrients the mother's milk had?

-- Ryan Johnson (romantic_sheepherder@yahoo.com), May 10, 2001

Answers

I have raised several calves on goat milk. If you can get any, it would be good.

-- wendy (weiskids@yahoo.com), May 10, 2001.

make sure you water the goats milk down, we did ours half and half.

-- lexi Green (whitestone11@hotmail.com), May 10, 2001.

Definitely use goat's milk, but also do water it down for a while. You should be able to gradually increase it to all milk as the calf's system gets accustomed to it.

-- Marcia (HrMr@webtv.net), May 10, 2001.

If you have a dairy close by, it would be a good idea to see if they might could let you have some colostrum (the first yellow milk that comes in when a calf is born.) You can freeze it for later use. If the calf seems sick at any time, give it some colostrum, that stuff is loaded with calf-specific antibodies.

You may be able to get some milk from a dairy for feeding the calf. Dairies dont get paid much for their milk. The prices on those white plastic bottles at the store goes mostly to pay the middlemen. If you give the dairy a little more than what the raw milk price is currently, he should be happy to let you have some.

God knew what to put into goat milk for raising baby goats. And what is in a cows milk is what is best for raising calves. I would use raw cows milk if at all possible.

-- daffodyllady (daffodyllady@yahoo.com), May 11, 2001.

If you can not find goats milk, purchase one of the better brands of calf milk replacer. The "cheap" ones are just that, cheap and deficient. Calves don't do nearly as well and a compromised calf can die on you really fast.

-- diane (gardiacaprines@yahoo.com), May 11, 2001.