Greetings on a sunny, moderately windy day in Utah!
It’s rapidly becoming evident that winter is over, and although my New England-wizened self says there will likely be one more kick before winter calls it good, I think the worst is behind us.
As far as the calves are concerned, Spring in the west offers a few “exciting” changes, most notably, the wind. Going to school in Ithaca, I thought I knew a thing or two about “strong” winds- the kind that will blow you off a sidewalk and turn your umbrella (in Ithaca, you always carry an umbrella) inside out. Turns out, I knew nothing. 30 mph “breezes” are the norm in this town, and spring is typically the gustiest season- offering more than a couple 50+ mph windy days. The plus side is we presently have no mud to speak of at the calf ranch, and the flies (how there are flies already I do not know) can’t stick to anything long enough to be a real problem. The wind does however, have the nasty habit of tossing empty calf hutches around and kicking up serious dust.
The other springtime challenge is nothing new to anyone who’s ever raised calves- pneumonia. After all, it’s no big surprise that 30-40 degree temperature variance every 24 hours can wreak havoc on the immune system of a month-old calf.
I was fortunate to land on a dairy that has a great Pfizer Animal Health drug rep who was able to hook us up with a vaccine that we spray up the calves’ nose before they come over to the calf ranch, followed by a booster dose at 5 weeks old. This stuff is awesome! No needles = happier calves; reduced incidence of pneumonia = happier calf manager!
In a perfect world the vaccine would work 100% of the time on 100% of my calves, but… perfection is in short supply, so I feed a supplemental grain pellet containing a low dose of antibiotic that is mixed into the regular calf grain. The antibiotics bolster the calves, providing extra protection during the cold-wet-wild temperature times of the year. Again, in the imperfect world, some calves are slow to start eating grain and therefore don’t get the preventative dose, so we inevitably have a few calves each week that will show signs of pneumonia.
As part of my typical day, I walk through each row of calf hutches, quickly monitoring the behavior of each calf, their bedding and their grain and water consumption. The benefit of the daily check means I catch sick calves before disease or injury is able to get out of hand. In the case of pneumonia, I look for a depressed calf with rapid breathing and/or a temperature of 102.5 degrees or higher. (100.5-101.5 is normal for those of you who might not have been on a dairy quiz bowl team in your youth J) As I identify these calves, I treat them with a one dose antibiotic of which I have become a huge fan. This stuff really works; it’s specifically designed to aggressively treat pneumonia in calves, so one dose given early into pneumonia onset has an extremely high efficacy rate- which means my calves feel better faster and continue eating and growing as usual. Even more importantly, it means I seldom have a calf that doesn’t recover fully and must be culled from the herd.
The cow lover in me very much appreciates that particular aspect, as selling or euthanizing calves that can’t get better, or just never fully recover, is by far the worst part of my job. Like most dairy farmers I know, I watch over all 600 of my current charges (in hutches) with attention that borders on obsession. I’ll do anything within reason to keep my calves healthy- and not just because calves that have to leave the herd represent an economic loss to the dairy farm. It’s actually because I hate to see a calf that starts out perfect at birth, suffer and be wasted due to something we didn’t do well enough. As such, most of my time is spent focusing on preventative measures, such as the vaccine and antibiotic feed additive, as well as optimizing calf nutrition and ensuring the cleanliness of everything the calf comes into contact with. It’s not the easiest way to raise calves, but doing things the right way doesn’t always mean doing them the easy way. If they could, I’m sure my calves would agree. I take their good health and rapid growth to be a resounding “we approve”.
So the desert spring can bring on the wind- I picked up a new windbreaker and I’m learning how to place calf hutches so they won’t blow away. The threat of pneumonia I could do without, but at least I’ve prepared the calves and ready to respond when prevention isn’t quite enough!
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