Feeding of calves up to 3 month age
At this stage calves require high plane of nutrition and good quality easily digestible feed. However, to speed up development of rumen and early initiation of microbial fermentation the calves should be offered calf starter and green grass from second week of life. As intake of calf starter and green grass increases milk has to be reduced gradually as per following schedule
Table 1 Feeding schedule for calves from birth up to 3 months of age
| Age (Days) | Whole milk (Kg) | Calf starter (Kg) | Green roughage (Kg) |
| 1 to 7 | 2.50 | nil | nil |
| 8 to 14 | 2.50 | 0.05 | 0.25 |
| 15 to 21 | 3.00 | 0.10 | 0.35 |
| 22 to 28 | 3.50 | 0.20 | 0.50 |
| 29 to 35 | 3.50 | 0.40 | 0.55 |
| 36 to 42 | 3.00 | 0.60 | 0.60 |
| 43 to 49 | 3.00 | 0.70 | 0.70 |
| 50 to 56 | 2.00 | 0.80 | 0.80 |
| 57 to 63 | 1.50 | 1.00 | 1.00 |
| 64 to 70 | 1.50 | 1.20 | 1.10 |
| 71 to 77 | 1.00 | 1.30 | 1.20 |
| 78 to 84 | 0.50 | 1.40 | 1.40 |
| 85 to 90 | Nil | 1.70 | 1.90 |
Adapted from Mandal et al (2003)
contributed by S.S Paul and Sunesh
Calf starters
Calf starter should contain 22% CP and 70-75% TDN and it should be prepared from good quality feeds i.e. easily digestible low fibre feed and has to be free from any kind of toxins or antimetabolites. Components of calf starters should be finely crushed. A few examples of calf starters are given in Table 2
Table 2 Some simple and flexible calf starters for buffalo calves
| Ingredient | Percent composition (Kg per 100 Kg) | ||||||||
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | |
| Crushed maize | 30 | 42 | 38 | 50 | 10 | – | – | 50 | 49 |
| Crushed barley/oat | 10 | – | – | – | 10 | 10 | – | – | – |
| Crushed ragi/jowar | 10 | – | – | – | – | – | 20 | – | – |
| Crushed wheat/rice | – | – | – | – | 30 | 40 | 30 | – | – |
| GN cake/soybean meal | 30 | 28 | 20 | 40 | 20 | 30 | 30 | 27 | 20 |
| Til cake/linseed meal | – | – | – | – | – | – | 8 | 10 | 10 |
| Mustard cake | – | – | – | – | 10 | – | – | – | – |
| Fish meal | 10 | 8 | – | – | – | – | – | – | 8 |
| Wheat bran | 7 | 19 | 26 | 7 | 10 | 10 | 10 | 10 | 10 |
| Molasses | – | – | – | – | 7 | 7 | – | – | – |
| Skimmed milk powder | – | – | 13 | – | – | – | – | – | – |
| Mineral mixture | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 |
| Common salt | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
10 g vitamin supplement (A, B2, D3) should be added in 1 quintal of the mixture if green fodders are not fed.
Adapted from Mandal et al., 2003