St. Landry democrat., 1883-08-25
Rearing Of Calves.

ore can have good stock, or improve
what he may have, unless he gives his
best care and attention to rearing his
calves. A calf is made or spoiled in the
rearing, and it matters less what the
parentage is than what the rearing and
training may be. There is no difficulty
whatever in rearing calves in diaries,
where the skinned milk can be used as
food for them. In butter diaries it is an
absolute necessity to rear the calves,
because good cows can not be purchased
at any reasonable price, or for less than
a large advance upon their actual cost.
The skill and care expended in rearing
calves to good COWS must be paid for,
as all skillful labor is, at q high price.
But the dairyman can easily rear
young animal to a productive condition
at two years of age, in the best manner,
for no more than twenty-five or thirty
dollars.
SKINNED milk is sufficient food for
calves. During the first four or five
days it may have the milk fresh from
the dam, but after that, skinned milk
may be substituted gradually. until in
week none but SKINNED milk is used.
It is necessary, however, that the milk
be fed warm and this is a specially in
dispensable point. Cold milk must be
warmed in the stomach, and the alb
straction of so much heat from this or
gan necessarily weakens digestive ac-
ton as well as wastes the food.
The milk should be warmed to ninety
degrees for the first two months. The
food should be given no more copiously
than it can be digested. Three quarts
at meal is ample for the first feeding,
and two meals day are sufficient. Fat
is not required to any large extent by a
calf that is to be reared for the dairy,
and whatever fat is needee to fill out
healthful tissue will be easily furnished
by the one or two per cent. of it left in
the skinned milk, or by the heterogeneous
matter of the milk. Six quarts dayis
equal to thirteen pounds, which will
furnish sufficient nourishment for
growth of one and one-fourth pounds Of
live weight daily. 1t will not do to sup
pose that if ten pounds of milk produce
one pound of live weight, twenty
pounds will produce twice as much.
We can not figure in that way insfeed-
ing animals of any kind. Overlooking
produces indigestion, loads up the sys-
tenn with injurious matter, retards
growth or stops it altogether, or even
reduces the weight previously gained.
Indigestion naturally results in diar-
rhea, a frequent and troublesome dis
ease in young calves, and often fatal
one. But it is easily avoided by escap-
ing the cause of it, which is generally
overlooking.
The feeding must be regular, and
when this word is used, it is meant in
its most exact and fullest sense, as re-
CARDS quantity, quality, condition of
food and time of feeding. Regularity,
in fact, is the most indispensable ele-
ment of success in the dairy, and it
should be as complete and perfect in
every way as the motions of nature. 1t
is one of the first of natural laws. and
the greatest advantage we can gain over
Nature in the domestication of our ami
mails is in avoiding those irregularities
which in a wild condition are caused by
accidents of weather and season. Its
practice in the dairy ensures health and
thrift in the animals, especially in the
young growing ones.
Cleanliness is also indispensable, for
the food must be clean and sweet to
avoid disturbance of the digestion and
nutrition. Fortunately, in the modern
improved dairy appliances, we have
perfect means of securing purity and
sweetness in the skinned milk, and |
this is as necessary for the rearing of
young calves as for the manufacture of
choice butter.
Warm and comfortable lodgings, too,
are closely allied to feeding; indeed they |
are indirectly a part of the feeding. for I
if to maintain the animal best under ex- T
posure to cold, which wastes it, we are
compelled to increase the food, we over
tax the weak digestive powers of the
young calf, and at once produce disor-
der and disease. Exposure to cold will,
of itself, produce Garrhea, which is
perhaps the only ailment in calves that /
we need to guard against.
After calf is month old, the feed |
may be gradually increased week by
week up to four quarts at a meal; and
at two months old a little mixed ground
oats. and corn may be given in the |
hand, until the calf will take an ounce
or so daily, from feed-bo It will
then begin to pick some fine hay or
clover (if it is a winter calf), or eat
grass in the spring or summer. For
the latter it is best to furnish a handful
of cut grass or clover, rather than to
turn the calf into field until it is four
months old. In the gradual increase
OF the feed the first sign of excess is the
appearance of diarrhea, which is easily
stopped by the Immediate reduction
of the food and the substitution Of a
quart of new milk, fresh from the COW,
given twice day. In treating diar-
rhea astringent drugs only make mat
tiers worse. "A warm, demulcent drink |