New calves...e

[CountryMommy]

So my dh broke down and agreed to let me have a calf on our "farm". Little did he know that when he said one I heard two and when we went to get them we agreed on three! We have two little Jersey cross girls and a Jersey cross boy. The girls are each 2-3 days old, but the little boy was only a day old when we got him. I have LOTS of questions and hope you all don't mind helping out a greenhorn...

1) We are bottle feeding them, and we know 4 pints twice a day... my question is what do you do when they won't take the bottle. We tried when we first got them home and they obviously weren't hungry or they were still stressed from the moving but when we tried later that night they gobbled it down (we also discovered that warm milk is better... I did say we are greenhorns at this remember ) I went to feed them this morning and again they aren't hungry.. can they wait until after Church or should one of us stay home to feed?

2) The little boy, Romeo, has loose stools. Is this because he is only a day old and the stress of moving to a new place, or should we be concerned with the possibility of scours? The other two don't seem to be having any trouble, but they are a few days older.

3) When should we start grain/hay?

I think those are all of my questions.... for now... I will post pictures later today of Tinkerbelle, Romeo, and Buttercup.

 

[JerseyXGirl]

The first thing I do with new bottle calves when bringing them home is buy some re-sorb electrolyte packets and give that to them the 1st and sometimes second day of feeding and them I go 1/2 and 1/2 with the packets and formula. This helps with scours and shipping stress and adjustment to the formula.

They really should be on a schedule 7am 7pm feedings or whatever but pretty close to 12 hour feedings. Sometimes it just takes patience and getting down with them and being persistant with the bottle till they nurse. If all else fails then sometimes you have to tube them to get fluid in. That consists of a tube being put down their throat. If your new at it then if this occurs you may want to call your vet to come out and show you how its done. If it's not done correctly you can fill their lungs and drown them.

I put water, grain, and hay out immediately even though they may not touch it for a week. One day you'll wonder if they'll ever eat hay or grain and the next you'll go in and wonder who ate it all.

 

[Imissmygirls]

the best advice my mother ever gave me was to treat my babies like i did my calves.

er.. well, what I mean is that calves are babies and you treat them as such for the first few weeks. Watch them carefully for any behavior change; feed them regularly and only the best stuff;

Jerseys are little critters- 4 pints at once may be too much for newborns. Try less, more often. Resorb is great. I'd also get some probiotic powder to mix with their milk daily. Cows need good bellybugs.
Spend a lot of time with them and baby them thru the first few weeks. Jerseys don't have a lot of body weight to fight sickness so jump on any suspected illness or digestive upset right away.