In North America, calves have traditionally been housed individually and fed restricted volumes of milk, about two litres, twice daily. However, over the past 10 years, studies have shown the benefits of increasing daily milk allowance, and group housing systems, on calves’ growth, health and welfare. One the other hand, giving more milk to calves and feeding them more frequently requires increased labour. Additionally, if calves are group-housed, monitoring individual feed intake could be difficult. Automated milk feeders, which are computer-controlled feeding systems, can overcome these challenges and facilitate group housing, while keeping the benefits of individualized feeding.
Current practices for calf management
My PhD research is focused on automated milk feeder use on
Canadian dairy farms. I’m interested in helping producers improve management
and efficiency of this system, and assessing the quality of life of calves
raised under these conditions. To improve calf rearing systems, researchers
need to first understand how producers are currently managing calves, and what
factors have influenced their choices in terms of milk feeding systems.
To achieve this, I, along with Drs. Derek Haley and Stephen LeBlanc, department of population medicine professors at the University of Guelph, developed a national online survey to collect data about calf raising management and feeding practices on Canadian dairy farms.
Read the entire article by Catalina Medrano-Galarza on page
44 of the November Milk Producer magazine.
