Weaning Protocols

[PureCountry]

[cleland]

I meant what do the cows get for vaccinations? I assume that your cows dont get any either? What about everyone else?

[RSL]

We use Express 5 on the cows 2 weeks pre-breeding. That's pretty well it.

[John SD]

Yesterday we did fall shots on a batch of the neighbor's calves with Pyramid 5 and Vision 7 HS. That's probably what I'll use on my calves.

MLV vaccines can be used on nursing calves as long as the shots on the cows are current within the past year. Neighbor's cows had ViraShield 5 shot last fall at preg checking time. My cows got PregGuard Gold FP 10 this spring a couple weeks before the bulls were turned out.

[PPRM]

I try to do all my shots prior to weaning. Fenceline weaning and the calves are real used to the bunks they are eating from and stay in the same pasture.

IBR/BVD/BRSV
Pastuerella
8 Way
Dewormer


We also hit with a Pink-eye vaccine

I think it is important to have claves on a good nutrtional plane before weaning. Including minerals. If they aren't truly hungry, then they get over it faster and easier. Otherwise, they really did need "Mamma" and it will show

[Kato]

Cows here get Cattlemaster 4 VL5 in the spring. Bulls too, as well as pinkeye and footrot vaccine. We do it on the way to pasture, so some cows are still bred. That's why we use the killed vaccine.

Calves get OneShot, Bovishield Gold, and Ultrabac/Somubac at pasture turnout. They get a booster at weaning. We haven't treated a calf in a long long time with this, except the odd one that wasn't old enough for the spring shot. Goes to show how well the double vaccination works.

We buy feeders to background, so we absolutely need to vaccinate everything in the yard. And vaccinate them well. By the time our replacement heifers are bred, they've had three goes of IBR/BVD vaccine.

Our own personal experience from buying feeders is that if we come across a herd that has no vaccination program, we will run the other way. It's one thing in a closed herd that stays on the farm until finish, but when these cattle hit a feedlot it is a disaster waiting to happen. You can pick these cattle out in the sick pen. They'll all have matching eartags. And they will not usually have any brothers left out in the main pen.

It works for PureCountry I expect, because of the lack of exposure to the kind of riff raff you meet at the auction mart. Our herd is not so lucky. They get to meet the riff raff.

We wean a couple of ways. We've sometimes just gone to the pasture, loaded the calves and left the cows behind. That works really well. The cows just hang around the corral and drive the neighbours crazy. The calves quit pretty quick because they're not getting any answers to their bawls. The pairs that all come home together get fenceline weaned. The cows choose between standing by the corral, and being out in the corn field. It doesn't take too much time before they prefer the corn.