Weaning/bottle calf ?

[Mike Fronczak]

It is a store bought (Dumor brand) bottle, pretty accurate I would hues being that half the time I bring water out in a gallon jug, it will fill the bottle 2 times and 1/4 or so, once you figure in for the milk replacer space in the bottle seems about right. The measuring comes with a container( that holds 2 cups) the rate is one cup per quart I believe (I will double check though), so one container per bottle. The grain thing may be tough and keeping him in with the other cows, I know for a fact the will eat it before he will, and our full grown cows get mean (pushy) over grain so we don't give it often. We keep it on hand for the horse & goat, and as needed when a cow gets in a pinch, one thing I learned (the hard way),even when primarily raising grass fed, grain has it places.

 

[Mike Fronczak]

Ive tried mixing a little milk in with some grain now (basically making cereal), giving him one bottle then that. Going to try just the opposite today give him that wait a couple hours then see how he does (if he figures it out). I have physically put it in his mouth as well.

 

[Mike Fronczak]

He didn't eat any of it, I ended up giving him 3 bottles @ 10 or so. Just dealing with other issues today don't have the patience today.

 

[Cricket]

I'm used to dairy, not beef, and don't understand how you're getting away with feeding him that much milk and not getting scours! I generally have to tweak mine along to get UP to ONE bottle--I'm jealous! At one month, my calves are pretty much just nosing at the grain and experimenting--I wouldn't expect much enthusiasm for awhile. And they're all different--my Jersey heifer would be open to new anything, my Holstein/Jersey steer took an extra month to wean completely.

Good luck! He's unbelievably cute!

 

[Mike Fronczak]

Messed him up today (on purpose) & it worked. I fed him his ussual 3 bottles last evening, this am I went out and just put a cup or two of grain in a feed dish (he has a water bucket & hay already), that's all no bottle. This evening I went out, his water bucket was down about 3 inches (so I know for sure he know how to drink from a bucket), grain dish was almost empty, I'm think that great. Mixed a bottle for him as I'm feeding him I notice the grain mixed in with the shaving, he spilled it. So I finished giving him the first bottle, gave him 1/2 of the second, then dumped it in his grain dish & got out of sight, to see if he would drink it, he was vocal for a couple minutes then started drinking it, 5 minutes or less it was gone. I wanted to try something, where I have the feed dish it's not level, probably 2-3 inches side to side. I dumped a cup or two of grain on the high side, mixed another 1/2 bottle and dumped it in the low side, again got out of sight. Sure enough he drank the milk replacer on the low side, then ate the mixed stuff and was working on the dry as I left . Tomorrow am my plan is to mix one bottle put in one dish & leave grain out in another, if he is eating the grain & some (little) hay, I'm very comfortable cutting his milk replacer back.

 

[Mike Fronczak]

I haven't updated in a while, after I messed with his schedule & it worked. We finally fixed the one fence for the paddock area, it originally had had a wire fencing liner (goat fencing), but our horse took it out a couple winters ago & I had just put posts & barbed wire, which he would walk under, now has wooden rails. I have him down to two bottles a day in the evening. He has a bag of hay, water, grain (usually 2-3 cups or so), and paddock area (small pasture), about 40x40, that we can now leave stall open to. Most evenings when I feed him the grain is gone, dish isn't completely licked clean though like the bigger cows do. He is definitely growing bigger, his diarrhea has cleared up as well by switching his foods up. I'm hopeing to be done with bottles maybe at tge endof the month, then start with getting him off the grain (we primaily grass feed), slowly probably will take another month I'm guessing. I don't want to try graining him in the pasture the bigger cows will just push him off it, separating every night is just a bigger pain. I really try to avoid giving the bigger cows grain we did it for a couple days in a row once, agressive about it, that was the end of that, our bull (especially) & steer were always ok though, so if I need to put another one in with him to help with weaning it will most likely be my bull, if he will come off the cows (if their in heat it's probably a lost cause).