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10-13C
Breaking stories
Next healthiest thing to outdoor calf rearing
By Mike Donovan
Dry, airy, inexpensive and able to rear a couple of caves each, these ‘pounds’ (see below also) can be separated by removing the drop-down bar that acts as a door also, and they are easy to store.
The traditional calf rearing shed, with its adjoining 4 ft wide individual calf pens for 30 or more calves, is becoming increasingly criticised by experts as well as by farmers.
Diseases can spread through the young calves in the shed at a surprising speed. If, as is often the case, the calf pens are located close to, or even in the same building as older cattle, the problems of air borne disease become even greater.
There are a number of alternatives, and one of these is the calf hutch.
The calf hutch problem, in turn, is expensive, because one is needed for each calf.
Hutches have transformed the disease transmission situation because each calf has its own air space.
Calves are not breathing each other’s air, so it stands to reason that they will pick up fewer bugs.
Here are a couple of calf rearing ideas that work on the hutch principle, but are less costly.
The timber hutch shown is made using three sheets of 8 x 4 ft board, some 3 x 3 timber and an 8 ft gate. The gate has a latch which hooks down to keep the sides of the hutch in place — otherwise the dung pressure forces the sides apart. There is a lifting rope attached to each leg and joined in the centre, and lying on the corrugated roof. The roof could be insulated with foam or made into a sheet metal/polystyrene corrugated sandwich.
The hutch can take more than one calf, which in theory destroys the principle of individual space, but in practice is still far preferable to rearing dozens of calves in the same air space.
The calf pound is circular, and has a roof that can be opened or closed, according to season. The two halves separate with rods, so they are easy to dismantle and store. There’s still good ventilation when the roof is down.
Calves should be installed in hutches as soon as possible. Using a calf shed for the first week (‘to get them started’) gives the bugs a chance to get started, just as much as the calves to settle into a routine. Hutches that are free from draughts, located with the opening away from the prevailing wind, and with a good bed of dry straw, won’t be cold.
Hutches are most conveniently sited on a sloping concrete bed.
The urine drains away and the floor can be quickly cleaned with a loader when the hutch is moved to the next site. But scalpings from your local quarry, or another surface material will work okay, and can be disinfected after the muck is cleared, so that the next bed is put on a germ-free standing.
Scours and pneumonia notch up the vet bills and notch down animal performance. You feel the first hit at the time the calves are poorly, and suffer the second over the lifetime of the animals concerned.
Studies have shown that calves which have had to be treated for these diseases turn into cows that milk less well, and steers that fatten less quickly.