feeding goats milk to bottle calves

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For those of you that feed your goat milk to calves. How much do you feed and how often? I'm talking about big holstien calves.Thanks

-- sherry in Arkansas (chickadee259@yahoo.com), March 02, 2002

Answers

Sherry, by big do you mean old?? We start our calves out on a quart, twice a day, with a quart of water added, no matter what size the calf is. If they don't scour, we slowly increase it until the full two quarts is given, twice a day. As they get older, if I have extra milk (usually skimmed) I feed them in a nipple bucket as much as they tolerate without going to loose on me.

-- diane (gardiacaprines@yahoo.com), March 02, 2002.

Diane, are you saying that you dilute the goats milk? do you dilute it by half? are they eventually drinking undiluted goats milk? I have thought about raising some calves on goats milk but don't relaly know that much.

-- Susan (dsowen@tds.net), March 02, 2002.

Diane, I've raised a few calves and was told yesterday that I was feeding to much. I've been doing a quart three times a day with about a pint of water in it and I then go to twice a day feeding with a quart and a half then build up to 2 quarts. Your probaly thinking, then why's she asking. I want to cut my milk down some because I took a calf when I was at my limit and am needing to stretch my milk a little. I have been getting 3 day old calves from a dairy but day before yesterday a cattleman called and he had a beautiful charlois heifer that's mama prolapsed earlier in the day, so I couldn't turn her down with goat clostrum in the freezer. I really like raising these calves, any tips or helpful hints are much appreciated.

-- sherry in Arkansas (chickadee259@yahoo.com), March 02, 2002.

sherry, perhaps the better idea would be to just buy a bag of milk replacer to supplement. IMO, until they are eating grain and hay rather well, you lose weight gain rate any lower than 2 quarts, twice a day. I like to raise them also.........would you believe I have a one year old that is still on a bottle?? The last one followed me onto the trailer at 18 month. (we always have extra milk)

-- diane (gardiacaprines@yahoo.com), March 02, 2002.

We feed claves straight goats milk, no dilutution. We first give the calves a dose of Immuno-G a immuno supplement and then a 7 way tab. Since we have been doing that our calves have thrived and we haven't lost any. They eat as much as they want as well.

-- Bernice (geminigoats@yahoo.com), March 02, 2002.


Susan, I just noticed your question. Yes, I dilute it by 1/2 and give a two quart bottle, twice a day for a couple of days. I don't do what Bernice does, just never had to. Goats milk is considerably richer than cows milk and, in my experience, it is easy to scour a calf those first few days if you give them too much goats milk. I think either my way or Bernice's would work just fine for a new calf. I personally just don't like messing with a bunch of meds and stuff. If I do manage to scour one, I make yogurt and mix it in their milk for a few feedings and sometimes raw eggs beaten up. Always works for me, except once when we had a nasty bug and had to medicate. Scours from a disease process smell entirely different than from and overeating problem.

-- diane (gardiacaprines@yahoo.com), March 02, 2002.

Diane,

I read your method, feeding the replacer. What replacer do you use? We used replacer, hmmmmm can't recall brand off top of my head, but we had horrible luck with it. We lost a lot of calves to pnemonia and scours when they were about 2 weeks old doing it that way. I might want to reconsider doing it with replacer if there is a reliable one out there. I need to find a different way anyways because we need all the milk now and have none to spare since we ship.

-- Bernice (geminigoats@yahoo.com), March 02, 2002.


Bernice, I have never had good luck with just replacer, except the really good Land-O-Lakes stuff, and even then it was an uphill battle. I only have had success if I mix it half and half with the goats milk. I know some do it and do it with ease, just never has happened for me. Of course, you have to remember, I hate doing all the medicines etc. so, in my case, I would just rather not do it if it will require all that.

-- diane (gardiacaprines@yahoo.com), March 02, 2002.

Thanks Diane. Oh gosh, I sure know what you mean about not using medicines unless its necessary. I do give the immune supplement to all my calves and kids. For what its worth, it seems to make heathier and heartier animals.

-- Bernice (geminigoats@yahoo.com), March 02, 2002.

Gosh Bernice, this is so wierd.........I got my pj's on and in bed and all of a sudden realized what you had said at the end of your post. You are SHIPPING milk. Wow, I didn't know you had gotten that far. I have so many questions. We had come so close to it here before the whole co-op collapsed and the cheese factory didn't come in. Are you Grade A or B?? Do you have to haul it yourself?? Are you happy with the product?? The only operation in the midwest that, IMO, puts up a really decent product are the Constidines. In Michigan the milk is only picked up ONCE a week and processed so horribly it gives goats milk a bad name. What kind of system are you using to milk?? Maybe I should take this to the dairygoat forum?? Way cool............are you making any money at it or is it too soon to tell?? Yup.......lots of questions. So happy for you.

-- diane (gardiacaprines@yahoo.com), March 02, 2002.


Thanks Diane for the happy thought. It sure wa s along road to get here, and in more ways than one! Now if I only had a penny for everytime I had my PJ's on too and then decided to relpy to a post I'd be rich

wow, so sorry to hear your coop didn't pan out. Maybe you can try again some day. I recall when i was on the board of the Mid-Atlantic Meat Goat & Marketing Coop back in VA we talked about incorporating a milk coop one day. So now that I moved 1,000 miles away and am just still a member I bet that maybe something will pan out. theya re looking to expand after they get their meat market in place, almost there too.

We are Grade A, but here in Arkansas, you can ship milk to Jackson Mitchell which makes that yummy canned milk Myerburg. JM wants manfactured grade milk like B or C for the canned milk segment of their business. So we will never see the prices paid per ctw like in CA. We get paid the same amount ofr our Grade A as does the B or c dairies here. We just go a raise so we get 20.50 per ctw instead of 18.50 and a little higher for higher Butterfat bonuses and low somatic cell count. Once we get started we can technically make a profit, but w eneed to milk about 150 to do that. I sold a buck last yr to a dairy in Michigan, the buyer has a dairy, don't know if its A or B/C, but she remarked she makes a check of almost 20,000 a month, I thought she added one too many 0's but she hadn't. but then to milk prices are better there. The coop up there helps to set prices. now i understand that there is a big movement there in Wisconsin for goat dairies. theres a fellow on Nubian Talk who has a website, he is buying up lots of milkers and can help folks get started in shipping milk.

I agree, the Considines do have the best practices for shipping milk or processing. And the thing thing that makes me so mad and get my dandruff up is folks or dairies that process milk and sell it to stores tasting yukky! Makes it hard for the rest of us who try hard.

Our milk is picked up every 4 days, the plant is about 15 miles away in yellville, AR so we pay 2 dollars to haul, its subcontracted. We're pretty happy, but i still would like to get paid grade A prices, like 40.00 per ctw instead. We are exploriong a deal with a company that will be making powdered milk for export in Michigan. They don't ahve the plant built yet, but are governmetn funded. Once the plant is built, figures in 3 yrs or 2 at earliest, he will buy our milk from us for 2 x's what we are getting here now. The only draw back is w ehave to supply 1500 gallons for him to send a tanker, but he would. he mentioned aksing other dairy folks here if they would also like to join in. the only problem is Jm is their bread and butter so they know the milk will always sell for them, don't want to take the risk. I figured that I would take risk, after all, nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Ou milking system now is a pipeline parlor, got a great deal on a used one. Our investment capitol was lower than maybe most would ahve since we already had a huge metal shop we converted to a dairy barn. But its still a lot of work.

I hope that one day we will make it and be very successful with our dairy, Lord knows i invested a lot and took great risks considering our farm was paid for in VA and we are in our 40's. I also ahve Jackie's Fudge as a back up, our goat milk fudge and can also sell legally of the farm 100 gallons a month without a permit if I had to, sells for 5-7 dollars a gallon.

any more questions, just ask away. Have a blessed night!

Gosh Bernice, this is so wierd.........I got my pj's on and in bed and all of a sudden realized what you had said at the end of your post. You are SHIPPING milk. Wow, I didn't know you had gotten that far. I have so many questions. We had come so close to it here before the whole co-op collapsed and the cheese factory didn't come in. Are you Grade A or B?? Do you have to haul it yourself?? Are you happy with the product?? The only operation in the midwest that, IMO, puts up a really decent product are the Constidines. In Michigan the milk is only picked up ONCE a week and processed so horribly it gives goats milk a bad name. What kind of system are you using to milk?? Maybe I should take this to the dairygoat forum?? Way cool............are you making any money at it or is it too soon to tell?? Yup.......lots of questions. So happy for you.



-- Bernice (geminigoats@yahoo.com), March 02, 2002.


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