creep feeding calves?

Anonymous-0 · May 26, 2011

Is it worth creep feeding calves? The ingrietiants I have are cobb corn that I bought for 140.00 a ton ,alfalfa hay that I can throw in the grinder.and oats that I bought for 2.50 a bushel.What is the recipei that you use.I also add 50lb.salt with selinium.dryied mollasis to get them to stat eating it.I do not add soybeanmeal seeing the high price.

rrlund · May 26, 2011

I'll just tell you,I creep feed with all homegrown feed. I usually start right after oat harvest. I start out with about 50/50 oats and ear corn. Closer to weaning in October,I back off on the oats and go a little heavier on the corn. It works great for me because by oat harvest,the pastures are usually getting a little more sparse and the calves are riding the fences,so if I get them filled up with grain,they tend to stay put better. I think they'll wean heavier on creep,sure. Beauty of it is,they know what grain is when I wean them,so there's less stress on'em.

LAA · May 26, 2011

You have a good mix, grind all three together, 50/50 grain and Alfalfa, or just the corn and oats if the pasture is pretty good and save the Alfalfa for when the grass runs out.

M Nut · May 26, 2011

I follow your plan exactly, and it works great for me too.

randallnMo · May 26, 2011

A good creep feed using a by-pass protein source fed to 3-450 pounds calves will produce a pound of gain on 4 pounds of feed. You'll have to plug in the numbers to see if it is profitable. Once a calf goes beyond 450 pounds, the feed conversion will jump to 6+ pounds of feed/lb/gain. Most creep feeds tend to get calves too fat.........but they do gain extra weight. Therefore it's back to the numbers again. I don't creep feed grain to my calves, mainly because I don't grow grain. I do free choice feed them alfalfa hay (2nd-3rd cutting) that I raise. I built two special creep feeders that I feed them their alfalfa hay. It is amazing how much alfalfa they will eat. They "grow" like you wouldn't believe. I"ve had people tell me I was "lying" when I said I don't creep feed grain. I just smile and go on.

formenwhogrow · May 26, 2011

It depends on your operation. If you run a rotational grazing set-up, you need a portable creep feeder which can be moved from pasture to pasture, this is doable but it's a pain. Not to mention, if you are rotating pastures, your calves are getting higher quality forage, therefore making creep feeding hardly worth doing for all the calves are going to gain. On the other hand, if you keep your cattle on a more permanent range, have the feed, and creep feeding set up, then it can't hurt to creep them. For years we fit into the latter category. We were feeding hay hay to the cows by mid august and creep feeding april calves by june. 3 years ago we went to more rotational grazing and quit creep feeding all together. I have noticed no significant diffence in the size of the calves at weaning time (october).

creep feeding calves?

Anonymous-0

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rrlund

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LAA

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M Nut

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randallnMo

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formenwhogrow

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