Calves & Heifers

The best way to save on calf starter without sacrificing growth and performance is to limit waste. These seven steps can help you save money on calf starter.

For decades, scours has been on record as the most common cause of death for preweaned dairy calves. Beyond the economic loss from death, scours increases treatment and labor costs, and reduces growth rates, thus affecting future production.

The more we learn about the birth process and what happens when calves enter the world, the more we realize how critical those first moments of life are.

Mother Nature does an excellent job of transitioning calves for life outside the womb.

Heifer raising is a major expense for the U.S. dairy industry, accounting for 15 to 20 percent of the total cost of milk production. Respiratory disease will significantly increase that cost, at up to $16.35 per pre-weaned calf and $2.22 for a weaned calf.

Whether we’re talking about a kid with one 4-H calf or a calf ranch with tens of thousands of calves, the key questions about feeding calves are the same. How do you minimize cost of production? What composition of protein and fat milk replacer should we feed? How much should we feed each day? And for how many days should we feed milk?

Gone are the days of feeding calves 2 quarts of milk or milk replacer twice a day, but while feeding higher levels of nutrition is the new industry norm, there’s still room to improve.