Successful calf rearing in Conna

Looking after calves takes up a huge amount of time and effort on dairy farms. Farmers with 50 or 60 cows might often wonder how those with larger numbers cope. In many cases, as cow numbers increase, calf-rearing tends to suffer as systems designed for smaller numbers fail to cope with bigger numbers and the result is sick calves and extra stress, on man and beast.

So what can we learn from those who have expanded? Bill O’Keeffe has grown his herd substantially over the last ten years and is now calving down 360 cows in a partnership in Conna, Co Cork, this year. Damien Callaghan is in charge of the calves on the farm.

Damien is on work experience from CIT, comes from a beef farming background in Mayo and has only been on the farm since last month, but despite this he has taken complete ownership of calf rearing on the farm. He also falls into the rota for milkings and takes part in the weekly grass walk.

The first place we visited was the calving shed. This is on a different farmyard to the main yard where the milking parlour is. There are cubicles for about 100 cows in this yard and a large straw bedded shed for calving. Both yards are on the same land block, so cows can walk between the two. As cows spring up, they are moved to the straw bedded area.

Newborn calves are taken from the cow and put into a different straw bedded pen soon after birth. They are fed three litres of colostrum within the first two hours, and another three litres within six hours. Both of these feeds are given through a stomach tube. The stomach tube they use is a three-litre bottle with the tube attached to the lid so there are no clumsy bags and long hoses to deal with.

Freshly calved cows are walked back to the main yard once a day and are milked into churns. This colostrum is pooled and brought back to the calving yard. There is a small shed alongside the calf holding pen and the colostrum is stored here, alongside a churn of warm water and another churn with the stomach tubes soaking in disinfectant.

The warm water is heated by an electric heater that sits in the churn. Damien says when a cow is calved they fill the bottle with colostrum and put it in the churn of warm water. By the time the calf is tagged and moved to the holding pen, the colostrum is warm and ready to be fed. The disinfectant used in the churn with the stomach tubes is GPC 8.

The newborn calves are moved to the main farmyard in a cattle trailer once a day. Back at this yard, the bulls are separated from the heifers and placed into different pens. Each pen holds 12 calves and when a heifer calf goes into a pen she never moves to a different pen. The bull calves are sold privately to a beef farmer at one week old.

Each pen measures 12ft by 16ft and there are 12 pens in total, so the calf shed can hold 144 calves when it is full. There is a 4ft concrete area to the front of each pen and then an 8ft straw lie-back, with a timber plank holding back the straw.

Watch a video of the calf pens area below:

Calves are fed twice a day for the first month using a teat feeder with separate compartments. Damien prefers these as he can identify calves that are off form quickly and it also means that slow drinkers have a better chance of getting their full allowance compared to other feeders that don’t have compartments.

The level of hygiene and attention to detail is immense. Nipple feeders are rinsed with water between pens. They are power-washed morning and evening. Peracetic acid is added to the water going through the power washer and this acts as a disinfectant. The concrete floor area is power-washed every day with water and peracetic acid also.

Heifer calves are fed milk replacer. Bull calves are fed waste milk pumped down from the dairy. There is a loft area above a store at the back of the shed and the power washer, water heater, milk replacer mixer and bags of milk replacer are stored here. A long hose from the mixer fills the milk feeders down at the pens.

The calves are on a high rate of milk powder at 900g per day after one week. For the first week, they are on 700g of powder per day. The powder used is Gain Easymix, which is 26% protein, and four litres of mixed milk is fed. When fed at the full rate, the milk is 22.5% solids which is much higher solids than cows’ milk. The calves are fed once a day at a month old.

“The goal here is to wean calves at a little over double their birth weight. We weighed a handful of calves and they are averaging about 30kg as they are nearly all Jersey crossbred. So target weaning weight is about 70kg and the goal is to get them to this as fast as possible and then get them away and out to grass which will reduce the workload as the season goes on,” Damien says.

A disease outbreak in calves is a nightmare that is magnified at scale because sick calves take so much time to treat. This farm is taking simple steps to avoid this. There is a protocol in place, it is logical, easy to understand and is working. I questioned Bill O’Keeffe about the level of powder being fed. He wants strong calves that will withstand inevitable disease pressure in March and April so is quite happy to feed a little more than normal to achieve this.