BRIEF COMMUNICATION: The effect of milk allowance on performance of dairy calves

摘要

Restricted milk diets increase and hasten the onset of solid feed intake in milk-fed calves (de Passille et al., 2011) and facilitate the weaning of calves, which reduces the growth check during weaning in comparison to ad libitum fed calves (Huuskonen & Khalili, 2008). As a consequence, dairy calves are commonly fed a restricted milk allowance of approximately 10% of a calf's BW (approximately 4 to 6 L of milk/d; e.g. Vasseur et al., 2012). However, calves fed a restricted amount of milk (10% of BW)show increased behavioural signs of hunger like non-nutritive visits to the milk feeder (Rushen & de Passille, 1995) and less growth pre-weaning when compared with calves fed more milk (Khan et al., 2007). Indeed, a growing body of research has consistently shown that calves fed more milk exhibit greater BW gains before weaning (see review by Khan et al., 2011).