If you're one of the many UK producers who has invested in improving your herd's genetics but been disappointed by poor heifer performance, you probably need to rethink your calf feeding strategy, says Volac's technical manager Maggie Gould. It constantly amazes me how often producers are prepared to invest up to 120 pound/head in straws of high-potential genetic material to optimise their dairy herd's performance but fail to feed their youngstock adequately to exploit that potential. Disappointingyields and poor reproductive performance in heifers is costly and dairy producers now need to realise that buying in high-potential genetics to optimise performance will fail if not supported by adequate feeding. Indeed recent work has demonstrated theeffect off correct nutrition during the first few weeks of a calf's life on future milk production. Traditional calf rearing systems using low levels of feeding or once-a-day feeding of calf milk replacer (CMR) are no longer adequate. Systems using restricted early feeding were developed for economic reasons over 20 years ago, when calves could be held back in the first few weeks of life and allowed to catch up later. At that time, UK dairy herds produced over 20 per cent less milk per cow and mature body size was much less.
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