MythBuster MONDAY: Baby calves are mistreated and don’t receive proper attention.

Fact: To help protect calves, dairy farmers place the animals in clean, dry, individual pens shortly after birth to control their environment, administer proper nutrition and vaccinations, and get them off to a healthy start.

First and foremost, the future of any dairy herd depends on the health of their newborn calves.   I believe that the care of baby calves is one of the most important jobs on a dairy farm.  On our dairy, another employee and myself are the primary caretakers of the babies.  It's quite the responsibility... let me tell you! 

After the calf is delivered safely, it is transported to a clean, dry, individual pen.  Within 6 hours, the calf is administered its vaccinations, the navel is dipped with Iodine (to dry it out and prevent infection), and then is bottle-fed colostrum.  Colostrum is their mother's, "first milk", and is powerpacked with vitamins, nutrients, and antibodies that set the calf's health up for life.  We bottle feed the calves to make sure that it receives the proper amount of colostrum.  This is really the most important step -- I can always pick out a calf that did not receive its colostrum on a timely basis because it will get sick more often than others.   

We feed our calves milk twice a day. The calf drinks out of a bottle for the first few days and then will transition to drinking out of a bucket.   They are also offered warm water throughout the year.   Calves are checked 4-5 times during a day and are regularly monitored by our veterinarian.

Pic of one of the little ones drinking from her bucket

Here is a video of a litte Jersey (about two weeks old) drinking her milk out of a bucket.  Jerseys are interesting little creatures and have quite the personalities.  This Jersey enjoys playing in the milk and playing with her bucket! It usually takes her twice as long as the Holstein calves to finish her milk.