Farmers who bought calves this year for beef production should be focusing on maximising the weight gain on these 2023-born dairy-beef progeny.
However, with the recent unsettled weather, it can be hard to keep things consistent within the dairy-beef calves’ diet and ensure they are thriving to their full potential.
At this time of the year, most spring-born calves are still only settling into their grass-based diet.
The ABP Food Group’s Advantage Beef Programme farm liaison team leader Amie Coonan has offered some advice to farmers to ensure their calves are thriving to their full potential.
She explained that the best type of pasture for calves is a slightly stemmy sward to ensure they are not getting excessive amounts of lush grass which can attribute to loose dung in calves.
Dairy-beef calves on ABP Demo Farm
There are approximately 400 calves on the ABP Demo Farm. These calves range in sire-type and birth date from January to late March.
The average daily gain (ADG) for calves at grass on the ABP Demo Farm is 0.85kg/day or 5.95kg/week across the board for the first grazing season.
ABP’s Sean Maher said that the stronger calves on the farm are surpassing this target “with ease”, while the plainer calves on the farm can often struggle to hit this target daily weight gain.
Fibre in feed
Fibre still plays an essential role in the calves’ diet and there are a number of ways farmers can ensure calves are consuming adequate amounts of fibre.
Hay or straw can be offered to calves in the field. This is a common practice on many calf-to-beef farms and all calves on the ABP Demo Farm have access to straw in their diet when at grass.
On stemmy pasture, a strip wire can be used to ensure calves are grazing both the leafy grass and the stemmy part of the sward.
Some of the causes and solutions for poor thrive in calves include:
- Lush grass and wet weather: Add fibre in the form of hay or straw;
- Stomach worm burden: Dung sample and speak to your vet;
- Coccidiosis: Dung sample and speak to your vet.
- Mineral deficiency: Consult with your vet to identify deficiency.
There are also a number of other causes and solutions for loose dung in calves and for calves not thriving.
When herding calves, it is important to listen out for coughing after the calves have been running or playing.
Coughing can be an indication of the presence of lungworm and a heavy lungworm burden will reduce thrive and daily liveweight gain (LWG).
If farmers are concerned about lungworm in their calves, they should speak to their vet.
Concentrates
Calves respond well to concentrate feeding but different farmers have different opinions on the level of concentrate feed that calves should be receiving while at grass.
At the end of June on the ABP Demo Farm, calves were being fed 1.5kg/head/day of concentrates. Typically, these calves would have been reduced to 1kg of concentrates/day after three weeks at grass but the higher feeding rates were sustained due to the drought conditions. All calves are now on 1kg/day.
The percentage protein in the concentrate feed has also decreased from 18% protein to 16% protein.
Dairy-beef calves should be offered concentrates based on grass quality and grass quantity as well as calf growth rates. If calves are not achieving the target growth rates set, farmers should identify the cause and consider adjusting the level of concentrate feed in their diet.