When you use the Milk Bar controlled flow system, common problems like cross suckling are reduced. This means you can choose whatever housing system suits your farm and potentially reduce labour by group feeding.

No matter what system you use, the calf’s digestive system remains the same. By delivering a controlled milk flow, calves are more robust and easier to raise with less cross suckling. Milk Bar feeders are designed to complement any rearing system from individually housed calves to large groups. Easy for you, healthy for them!

Protocol:

1. Fit a new Milk Bar Teat to your single feeder.
2. Either number or colour code the feeder and the hutch.
3. This feeder stays with this calf until weaning.
4. After weaning, replace the old, worn teat with a new.
5. Milk Bar Teat ready for the next calf.

Cleaning:

1. Daily rinse and twice a week use an Alkali Detergent with a hot wash.

Perfect feeders for individually raised calves!

This system is the best of both worlds, an individual housing start gives you great observation of young calves and then transitioning to a group slashes your time.

The trick with this system is to make sure calves are drinking from a teat which is the same age as the calf.

We developed the Milk Bar Follow the Teat System to make this as simple and user friendly as possible.

Protocol:

1. Fit a new Milk Bar Teat to your Milk Bar single feeder.
2. Either number or colour code the feeder and the hutch.
3. This feeder stays with this calf for 10 days or whatever your preferred time frame is.
4. When you have enough calves to make a group, remove the Milk Bar Teat from each of the single feeders and insert them into the group feeder. 
   This group feeder now stays with these calves until weaning. 
5. Place a new Milk Bar Teat into the now unneeded Milk Bar single feeder ready for the next new calf. 

Important: Making sure calves get enough milk volume is vital. There should be no more than two-week age difference in calves.

Bigger calves need more milk so it's best to group large calves together.

Cleaning:

• Daily rinse and twice a week use an Alkali Detergent with a hot wash.

No matter what your rail type, we have a feeder to suit!

We love to see calves in groups. They interact and zoom around and, in the winter, lie close together for warmth.

For farmers in New Zealand, Ireland and Australia, group feeding from Day 1 is normal.
In fact, we're pretty sure we've never seen an individual system in any of these countries!
Calves are born in the spring so there is a large volume of calves in a short time to make grouping of calves the same age an easy task.

There are many benefits to group feeding, most significantly the reduction of time, labour, and the improvements in calf behaviour. Cross suckling can be a barrier to group feeding, however there is a simple fix, slow the milk flow, regulate the intake and calves stop cross suckling!

A lot of study is being done around the benefits of group feeding.
A study at the University of British Columbia found that pair-housed calves continued to gain weight after weaning while individually housed calves experienced a lag in weight gain after weaning. Group or pair-housed calves also experience group learning. In a study performed at Utah State University, calves housed in groups learned to eat calf starter at an earlier age than calves housed individually. Consumption of calf starter promotes rumen development to increase feed efficiency.

Protocol:

1. At the start of the season or for each new batch of calves, put new Milk Bar Teats into your group feeders.
2. At weaning, discard the worn teats and at the start of the new season or batch of calves, place new Milk Bar Teats so the next wave of calves starts with the right flow of milk.

Cleaning:

• Daily rinse and twice a week use an Alkali Detergent with a hot wash.

Small groups, or large groups, we've got a feeder to suit!

The Milk Bar Teat works in harmony with the digestive system. Because there is no valve in the teat, calves can suckle the teat in the same way as they would from a cow. The suckling instinct kicks in to make training easier.

Any teat with a valve changes the way calves drink from a natural suckling to a pump action. It’s not marketing, it’s simply the truth.
It’s tempting to use a fast flow teat to train young calves. The idea is that the faster flow will encourage calves to latch on. There are a couple of things to watch for if you use a fast flow teat:

1. Check the calf can swallow easily and that she’s not struggling to breath.
2. Check she is producing thick saliva. This is important to strengthen immunity.

The post birth protocol should stimulate the calf to stand up and look for feed. Giving the calf a good rub in long firm strokes not only dries her off but stimulates blood flow and ‘wakes her up’.
Provide a draft free space for new-born calves, with a heat lamp in the winter.
When she starts to try to stand up then she is ready to feed.

Use a Milk Bar bottle or single feeder fitted with a Training Teat with fresh colostrum (or colostrum replacer containing IgG), then follow these steps:

The role of the colostrum

A calf’s immune system is not fully developed when it is born, and she must rely on passive immunity from colostrum until her own immune system is developed at 1 to 2 months of age. Colostrum contains the antibodies or immunoglobulins (IgG) to protect the calf from disease.

When the calf is born the gut is still ‘open’ so the antibodies are able to pass through the wall and straight to the bloodstream. By 24 hours the gut begins to close, and it is difficult for the calf to absorb the antibodies as the intestine becomes impermeable to large proteins.
Studies have shown that:

• Six hours after birth, calves absorbed 66 % of the immunoglobulins in colostrum
• 36 hours after birth calves were able to absorb only 7 % of immunoglobulins.
• As well as immunity, colostrum contains approximately 22 % solids, compared to 12 % solids in normal whole cow's milk.
• Much of the extra solid material in colostrum is immunoglobulin, but colostrum is also an important source of protein, sugar, fat, and vitamins A and E

Using a Milk Bar Colostrum Teat has a double benefit during this period. The saliva produced while suckling further boosts immunity and because the action is natural to the calf, she is super easy to train!

Generally, a calf should receive 5 to 6 % of its body weight as colostrum within the first six hours of life, and another 5 to 6 % of its body weight when the calf is 12 hours. For example: 40kg calf receives 4 – 4.8L

Calves need milk. More milk than they often get. There are lots of regimes being promoted so it’s hard to know what the right amount is, however, if you work on the rough rule of 10% of bodyweight you can’t go too far wrong.

A 60kg calves needs more than 5L per day so ideally use scales or a weigh tape to make sure calves are getting enough milk. 
If you have a mixed weight group, scale up rather than down. This makes sure the bigger calves have enough, the smaller calves will just have better daily gains!
Don’t worry, the controlled flow of the Milk Bar Teat prevents nutritional diarrhoea if some calves get more volume than they need.

It’s worth feeding a little bit more than not quite enough to get better Average Daily Gain (ADG).
Good ADG has positive outcomes such as better conception rates and increased first lactation milk production. 

Week 1-3

• All energy comes from colostrum or milk. A calf takes no energy from grain during the first few weeks, so it is important to feed enough milk to meet all energy needs. 
• Starter ration in the diet is important from week one to start rumen development.

Week 4

• Now the rumen is starting to develop. Small amounts of energy are taken from ration, but the majority of energy is still from milk.

Week 6

• By the end of the week six (42 days) the rumen should be developed enough for milk to be reduced. If the calf is eating 700 grams of starter ration per day, then the milk volume can start to be reduced. 

Week 12

• The rumen should now be developed enough for the calf to continue to grow on pasture, pasture-based feeds or grain-based feeds depending on your feeding regime.

Weaning

• To prevent weight loss at weaning it is important the calf has had ad lib starter ration from Week 1. When the calf is eating 700gms of starter ration the milk can start to be reduced and be fed once a day.  Providing the calf is consuming a minimum of 1kg of grain or has doubled its birth weight it can be weaned from 8 weeks.

Do not go to once a day feeding under 42 days. 
Ideally calves on once a day milk feeding should be fed in the evening. The calf will then sleep on a full stomach but will be hungry during the day. With ad lib concentrate available they will consume more to accelerate rumen development. 

Don’t forget! In cold weather you need to increase the volume by 2% every degree under 5°C. So if the milk volume is 5 L:

• At 4°C increase 2% = 5.1 L
• At 0°C  increase 10% = 5.5 L
• At -5°C  increase 20% = 6.0 L
• At -5°C  increase 20% = 6.0 L

To work out volumes for best results, then knowing the energy value is important. A 40kg calf requires 6.8 MJME per day for maintenance in fair conditions and will require more energy in cold, draughty, or damp conditions.
Calves need 11.4 MJME (Mega Joules of Metabolisable Energy) to gain 1 kg of live weight.

Example: For a 40kg calf to gain 0.8kg per day it requires a minimum of 15.9 MJME (6.8 for maintenance plus 80% of 11.4 MJME to gain .8kg). This equates to 5.3 litres of whole milk.

Available MJME (approximate) per product:

Source: Dexcel factsheet

If that's a bit complicated and your feeding whole milk, this is what we feed our trial calves.