As I outlined in a previous North Country Ag Advisor article (July 2019), there are several benefits to group/pair housing of calves including: increased solid feed intake before weaning and increased weight gain (Miller-Cushon and DeVries, 2016); improved social learning, more adaptable calves, and reduced fearfulness (Bolt et al., 2017; De Paula Vieira et al., 2012; Costa et al., 2014; and Gaillard et al., 2014); more useable space for calves to play; and improved consumer perspective. Even with all these potential benefits, when discussing socially housing calves, some of the biggest concerns producers usually have is how to manage the calves in a group and how to prevent cross sucking. As the push for more social housing increases and more producers are implementing this practice, the industry is learning more about how to best manage it for the calves and the farm workers. Thankfully, there are some strategies that have been shown to reduce cross sucking. However, keep in mind that even if you follow all of these steps, you may still have some calves that cross suck, but research has suggested that this won’t actually negatively impact future udder health (Vaughan et al., 2016).
1. Feed enough milk.
Feeding calves more milk will increase their time spent eating and help keep them feeling full, which will reduce cross sucking. Regardless of how you house calves (individual, pair, or group), it’s beneficial to feed them enough milk. Older industry recommendations stated that pre-weaned calves should consume 10% of their body weight in milk or milk replacer, or about 4 to 6 quarts a day. When talking to producers that provide calves ad libitum (unlimited) access to milk, the animals usually top out at 12-14 liters (or 3 to 3.5 gallons) per day! Some producers are concerned if they feed more milk that the calves will scour, but research suggests that they won’t, they will be healthier overall, and will have better growth. It’s also important to recognize and understand the difference between pathogenic and nutritional scours. Feeding higher planes of nutrition may result in more lose manure but this is natural. To learn more about nutritional vs. pathogenic scours please refer to https://blogs.cornell.edu/northcountryregionalagteam/2021/04/12/pre-weaned-dairy-calf-calorie-requirements-and-nutritional-scours/. Feeding more milk may seem like a financial setback, but it will pay back in dividends in production alone over the course of that calf’s productive life. A meta-analysis of 12 datasets (Soberon and Van Amburgh, 2013), found that calves fed more milk or milk replacer went on to produce more milk themselves. Specifically, they found, on average, that every 1 kg increase in average daily gain pre-weaning translated to a 1,550 kg increase in milk production during that calf’s first lactation.
2. Feed milk from nipple (not bucket) and a slow flow nipple.
Calves have a strong natural desire to suckle, which is why producers see calves performing non-nutritive oral behaviors (such as sucking on parts of their pen) and cross sucking when the calves can consume their milk very quickly. A recent study from the Journal of Dairy Science (Salter et al., 2021) found calves that were fed milk via a bottle and teat took longer to eat compared to calves fed milk via a bucket (Figure 1). Further, this translated to less time spent cross sucking for the teat bottle fed calves (Figure 2). Take it one step further, and increase the time spent eating even more by using a slow-flow nipple.
Figure 1. Time spent drinking milk for pair-housed calves fed via milk bucket or milk bottle teat (Salter et al., 2021).
3. Wean gradually. Weaning abruptly can lead to unwanted non-nutritive behaviors and cross sucking. To minimize this, wean calves gradually or with a step-down program and monitor grain intake. Industry recommendations suggesting waiting until a calf is consuming 2 lbs of grain/day to start reducing milk, and according to the Dairy Calf and Heifer Association Gold Standards, they should be consuming 3-4 lbs/day for a few days before completing removing milk.
4. Reduce competition.
Make sure there are enough nipples for the calves in the pen. If you have pair-housed calves, provide them each with a feeding station, and in a group-housed ad libitum situation, provide multiple nipples so multiple calves can eat at once.
5. Offer chopped hay.
At a young age, calves won’t each much hay, but research has shown it can help calves develop feeding behaviors that will be beneficial when their diet consists of more forage.
Early hay provision may increase starter intake, improve feed efficiency, result in higher average daily gain, promote rumen health, and it may even help with cognitive development.
Plus, it gives them one more “oral behavior” to do that isn’t cross sucking.
6. Feed starter from specialized starter teat bottle.
According to Version 4.0 of the FARM Program, all dairies should be offering solid feed (either hay or starter) to all calves starting by day 3. Most dairies choose to offer a little bit of starter feed in a bucket. Salter et al. (2021) found that offering this starter in a specialized starter teat bottle (seen in the picture below) reduced the amount of time calves spent cross sucking (Figure 2).
Photo credit: www.coburn.com/braden-start-nurser-complete
Figure 2. Time spent cross sucking for pair-housed calves fed milk with a bottle teat or milk bucket and for fed starter with a bucket or specialized Breaden teat bottle (Salter et al., 2021).