dinderleat
Member
- Location
- Wells
Don’t be scared of feeding more than 3 litres if you have the milk think @jimmer is feeding 20+
All things Dairy
- Thread starter Cows 'n grass
- Start date
- Location
- Northern Ireland
I'm not scared of it. It's just that above three litres X2 seems to noticeably increase the risks of wet tails and off calves here. Some will just be too full at evening feed i.e won't bother getting up to feed. Which is invariably counter productive for several reasons.
Real milk or powder?
I thats it
Member
I find it similar here, if I get towards 3 litres in a morning they seem very laid back and not at all keen at afternoon feed
- Location
- somerset
2 liters of colostrum, x2 a day, acidified, is about the max for 2 weeks, then, can up it. We are going to try ad lib, on beef calves, nov, just trying to sort out how to keep it warm, and stirred, thought we could use our milk taxi, but 'agitates' to often, and milk would curdle, trial and error session coming !
- Location
- Northern Ireland
Mainly 30% skim powder.
dinderleat
Member
- Location
- Wells
Feed more powder1kg+ but you won’t get the bloom like whole milk does
I guess that's the difference. 8l at 9% solids is probably near 12l of powder mix.
At recommend mixing rates what % of solids does powder make?
- Location
- somerset
i don't think mix rates of powder, have altered since the 70's, certainly i was 50% more than rec, in the early 2000's.
I am also quite sure, many farmers think that is plenty, but, as we all know, feed to growth ratio, can only decrease, as calves age, and wont realise, max intake, = max growth, with young calves, we struggle to get 4 liters in, at the start, but, it is colostrum, so we do dilute it, to increase intake.
I’ve just started feeding powder for the first time, as a Johnes control measure. 150g per litre, up to six litres a day, might go to 1kg of powder a day. They’re growing well, with concentrate and water , will wean at 9 weeks.
Isn’t that 720g of solids? 12 l of powder here would be 1.8 kg, mix rate 150g/l ! New to powder .
1.8kg of powder, but that isn't 1.8kg ms or is it? I'm confused. We can't do calves on powder, we get sh!t results and the time taken to sort it out is considerable
I don’t know, it’s the first time for powder here, using a reverse ratio powder, more protein than fat. So far very impressive, straight on to a starter powder for a week, then the main powder till weaning, about two weeks in so far.
The drymatter of milk is several percentage points higher than the combined fat and protein. Especially fresh calves cow milk.
Iirc 12-15%
So 15%x 12l would be 1.8kg
Maybe, I know calves do well on milk, but powder here now so far , so good.The drymatter of milk is several percentage points higher than the combined fat and protein. Especially fresh calves cow milk.
Iirc 12-15%
So 15%x 12l would be 1.8kg
- Location
- Northern Ireland
Dry powder analyses at roughly 25%protein and say 20 oil, depending on your product. I'd imagine that's on a dry matter basis, and I don't know what the dry matter content of powder is. Call it 90% for rough counting.
- Location
- Northern Ireland
What happens, and why do you think it happens?
Jdunn55
Member
- Location
- Helston, cornwall
When we went down with tb last autumn I kept 10 cows to calve and reared the calves on powder. They were drinking 12 litres a day at peak over 3 feeds. Increased the percentage of powder considerably. It was far more expensive and I'm not sure if I had 100 calves to feed I would do 3 times a day again but I only had 10 so they were treated like royalty.
On the other hand they all hit 100kg by 6-7 weeks, 120kg by 8-10 weeks and 150 by 12 weeks (came off powder at 10 weeks with weaning starting at 8 weeks cutting back by 1 litre each day)
They're all strong healthy yearlings now and look amazing with some outperforming the calves kept on their mothers but that could be a breed thing
On the other hand they all hit 100kg by 6-7 weeks, 120kg by 8-10 weeks and 150 by 12 weeks (came off powder at 10 weeks with weaning starting at 8 weeks cutting back by 1 litre each day)
They're all strong healthy yearlings now and look amazing with some outperforming the calves kept on their mothers but that could be a breed thing
What breeds are they?
Jdunn55
Member
- Location
- Helston, cornwall
Mostly limousins and charolais crosses, bit of simmental and some holstein blood left over from dads herd