Small, crossbred dairy heifer calves who were fed Golden Maverick Triple A milk replacer in a 2022 Bicton College feeding trial, doubled their birth weight by weaning at 66 days.
Farm manager, Robin Bowden from the Wastenage Farm Group is delighted with the results of the trial, pointing out that the growth rates for Bicton College’s small breed of calves exceeded the rearing unit target of 600g plus/day, and were in line with industry expectation for this size of calf.
“We run an extensive dairy farming system here with a high stocking rate, block calving 180 Friesian x Jersey x Norwegian Red cows in the spring to take advantage of peak seasonal grass growth to produce high-quality milk.
“We supply our milk output on a constituent-based contract and one of our key performance indicators (KPIs) is ‘kg of milk solids sold/hectare’, and crossbreed dairy cows are perfect in this respect,” he said.
In the trial conducted at the Devon-based agricultural college, 49 crossbred calves were fed Golden Maverick Triple A milk replacer; from an average birth weight of 31.2kg until weaning at a target weight of 70kg.
Newborn calves were left on the dam to suckle colostrum for up to 24 hours before being removed and fed colostrum via a bottle and teat at a rate of three litres twice a day.
“Calves were moved to the dedicated calf housing within 48 hours of birth and penned by birth date in small groups of 10 calves per pen.
“From day three, the predominantly February-born calves were fed reconstituted milk replacer through Milkbar feeders (12 teats per pen of 10 calves),” explained Úna Hickey, Volac spokesperson.
Golden Maverick Triple A
“Golden Maverick Triple A was mixed at the rate of 125g powder with 875ml of water to make one litre of mixed milk, and then fed at the rate of up to 750g/day in two three litre feeds.
“Fresh water, calf starter pellets (18% crude protein) and barley straw were made available ad lib from day 3,” said Úna.
Úna added that the calves were monitored during the spring of 2022, with a final weighing marking the end of the trial on May 27, 2022.
“These small calves gained 0.62kg/day on average throughout the study period and at weaning (mean age 65.5 days), 88% had at least doubled their birthweight.
“This recorded growth rate is in line with what is to be expected from small crossbreed dairy heifer calves.
“A growth rate of 500 to 600g per day will help ensure these heifer replacements achieve set targets throughout the rearing period – calving down with 85-90% mature body weight at first calving at 24-months-of-age,” she said.
Robin Bodwen is in agreement: “The mature body weight of cows in the Bicton College dairy herd is only 525kg. Indeed, our calves are quite small when born and our target body weight at three months of age is 89kg.
“But in this trial, our calves achieved 92kg on average at a mean age of 3.5 months, which is bang on target, so the milk replacer certainly more than did its job.”
In addition, calf health scores were taken daily, with no respiratory disease recorded and only three calves recording a high faecal score.
“What we can conclude from the trial is that feeding these calves Golden Maverick Triple A milk replacer at a rate of up to 750g powder per day (6L at 12.5%) resulted in sound, healthy 600g plus growth rates up to weaning – and perfect for small crosbreeds,” said Úna.
