Improving a calf’s level of immunity requires proper colostrum management, a quality nutrition and vaccination program, and minimizing environmental and other stressors. Rearing healthy dairy calves requires maximizing the calf’s level of immunity against disease while minimizing its exposure to infectious agents. Longevity and milking ability are highly related to how she was raised. Her longevity in the milking herd and her milking ability will determine whether that investment is returned along with a reasonable profit.

When a heifer freshens, someone has at least a two-year investment in her with no return on that investment up to that time.

How she is raised, fed and managed determine what she will actually do. The genetics of this heifer determine what her potential is. Management goals for the first 6 to 8 weeks of a calf’s life should be to minimize disease and mortality by providing a suitable environment, establishing a quality nutritional program and implementing a preventive health care plan. The greatest mortality and morbidity period for dairy cattle is from birth to weaning. Heifer calves are raised as replacements for lactating cows and are essential to the successful future of the dairy.

Raising dairy bull calves for profit