Excellence in youngstock welfare

Jim, a professor of large animal medicine and welfare at Western University of Health Sciences in California, discussed the science behind calving, calf management and the transition phase, linking this with Joe Carters, management systems.

For Jim, it is important to treat animals with compassion, dignity and respect. He explained how welfare can be maximised by understanding and making use of natural behaviours.

A cow’s instinct is to hide her calf somewhere quiet and secluded so she can go and eat, while the calf safely sleeps.

We can take advantage of this by managing the separation of cow and calf during this window to minimise stress and anxiety, improving welfare.

A number of changes were implemented at Carpenters Farm which have improved growth rates and reduced scouring, which included:

• The introduction of gail breakers to the calf pens
• Removal of five bar feeder for wydale calf feeder with individual compartments 
• New hay racks with vertical bars making easier for the calves to get the straw out
• Improved our cleaning regime on the feeding equipment
• Stopped tubing calves with colostrum and are bottle feeding which is improving the transition to teet feeders
• After the event they will be looking to extend the period in which we provide colostrum in the first week