Well, now that the lambs are all up and running I couldnt resist letting the kids get a couple of bottle calves.

We got them from a local dairy at 4 days. Now they are 13 days. They are holstein bull calves. He was feeding them 2x day and giving them 1 3/4 bottle per feeding of cows milk.

I started them on milk replacer but the bag says 1 bottle 2x per day. I started out that way and they look very skinny, my beef neighbor thinks that they are too skinny. So I added a half bottle midday. They still seem very hungry. I am starting them with grain. Of course they done eat enough to make a diffrence.

They go back and forth between scour and normal. I have given them pepto bismal. This morning I gave them raw eggs but they didnt look too bad this morning. According to my beef neighbor they had not been scouring very bad when they were scouring.

So now I am wondering- should I follow the directions and give 1 bottle 2x day, inspite of the fact that they seem very hungry. Or continue with the extra feeding and worry about the scours.

Additionally, one that is not as frisky as the other now has watery eyes. They arent pink. He is mooing quite a lot too. His appetite is still good.

The less frisky one was very lethargic the first day and we gave a vitamin b shot which helped enormously! I am going to go see if my comfrey is up at all and try some of that too.

I guess while I am asking, I banded the frisky one last weekend. The other didnt have both testical down yet. How long before it will be too late to use the band on him? I thought I would check again Wednesday or so to see if it dropped, but I hate to band him if he isnt feeling well.

Thanks in advance. Tami in WI

-- tami in wi (windridg@chorus.net), April 16, 2002

Answers

A hungry calve is a healthy one . Do not over feed , they will scour . 2 bottles a day is enough . Make sure the milk replacer is all milk no soy . Start with a medicated gain , put some in you hand and put it in there mouth , do this everytime you go out to check on them . Also have water available at all times . A bottle of water in the afternoon would be ok if they dont drink fom a bucket yet.

-- Patty Gamble (fodfarms@hotmail.com), April 16, 2002.

It has been my experience that Holstein calves often find both whole milk and milk replacer to be too rich. Cows of that breed give less cream in their milk than many (most) other breeds. Also, when you mix the replacer, the powder takes up a lot of room in a container, so for example, if you mean to mix a gallon of replacer, and you have a one gallon pitcher to mix it in, once you put in the powder recommended for one gallon, there is no way that you have room in the pitcher for one gallon of water. This results in a too rich mixture of replacer. You may want to try diluting the replacer a little to help with with the scouring problem.

-- Dianne Wood (woodgoat@pacifier.com), April 16, 2002.

Do not feed these calves this much. When I first started I had the same inclination as you do, so don't feel bad. I feed the my calves 3/4 bottle of Water with nearly a cup of Purina 20-20 all natural twice a day. The calves do seem skinny for the first month, but after they get used to the grain (I feed Purina Startena) they will grow like weeds. Also, I like to band after 3 weeks but before 3 months to avoid having to give a tentanus shot.

-- Ross Birkenfeld (rafterb_livestockco@hotmail.com), May 08, 2002.