[brendan lyons]

Hi there

I am unsure of how much meal  and fodder to feed black angus and limousin calves. They will be sold on for meat at 2 years. Over the winter how should i feed them? Obviously i feed them meal and silage but how much/how often?, do i add hay into the equation? etc

[si-mate]

Silage / Hay / Straw should be fed ad-lib and I would feed a 16% ration somewhere between 1.5kg and 3.5kg per day depending on which forage you are using and the quality.


If you are feeding more than 1.5kg / day I would split it into two feeds.

[SallyintNorth]

If you bed them on good quality straw, and give them a bit of clean straw each day, that'll keep them clean and they'll munch on at the straw too, which is good forage for them.

Silage may make them a bit runny unless they have straw too.  Some people say hay makes them runny but that's not my experience.  Mind our hay is proper meadow hay, the grass rarely sees artificial fertiliser and then only a tiny amount.

Ad lib forage yes, but with young calves it needs to be fresh, and good quality, soft stems.  Don't just fill the hay rack up and leave them to it for days on end, it's best to give them only what they'll eat twice a day so it's always fresh.

At three months they should be eating 0.5 to 1 kilo of 16% cake each twice a day.  If your forage is good, that's a reasonable level to keep them on through the winter.  Personally I wouldn't push them harder at this age as you are planning to keep them through to finishing at 24 months.

[brendan lyons]

If you bed them on good quality straw, and give them a bit of clean straw each day, that'll keep them clean and they'll munch on at the straw too, which is good forage for them.

Silage may make them a bit runny unless they have straw too.  Some people say hay makes them runny but that's not my experience.  Mind our hay is proper meadow hay, the grass rarely sees artificial fertiliser and then only a tiny amount.

Ad lib forage yes, but with young calves it needs to be fresh, and good quality, soft stems.  Don't just fill the hay rack up and leave them to it for days on end, it's best to give them only what they'll eat twice a day so it's always fresh.

At three months they should be eating 0.5 to 1 kilo of 16% cake each twice a day.  If your forage is good, that's a reasonable level to keep them on through the winter.  Personally I wouldn't push them harder at this age as you are planning to keep them through to finishing at 24 months.

Sorry to sound like a novice here but what do you mean by cake, i have never heard that phrase used over here in Northern Ireland.

[Marches Farmer]

Usually pelleted feed from a manufacturer like BOCM Pauls.  Comes bagged or in bulk, when it can be blown into a hopper or silo.  Must be kept very dry and watch the use by date as mineral content decreases with age.

[SallyintNorth]

You can get pellets, where all the ingredients are blended into little 'pencils', and 'mix', where the individual ingredients - rolled grains, seeds, etc, as well as some pellets - are distinguishable. 

For training young calves to eat cake, we use a mix, so they can pick out the bits they like best.  If it suits you better to feed pellets you can gradually change them to pellets later once they've learned to eat cake.

[si-mate]

Sorry I've just re-read your post and realised you are talking about calves, for some reason I had it in my head you were asking about older animals, so ignore what I posted above until they are around 8 months plus.


With calves I give them ad-lib calf starter pellets and good wheat straw. At least once a day I throw out any un-eaten straw onto their bed and add in fresh.
At around 12 weeks I move them from calf starter pellets onto a 16% grower ration giving 3kg per head per day split into two feeds.