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Creep feeding calves

Welcome Sunnyside. I can't help you much here. My thoughts on creep is to have them on good grass making it unnecessary.
 
Sunnyside Stock Farm said:
Hi all, I'm new here and was just wondering at what age you all start creep feeding your calves (if you do)? Also, what do you use in your creep feed?
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Welcome.

We have creep fed our calves in the past, and we have neighbours and friends that do it regularly. Generally we will start them in July or August, when they are 3-4 months old. Before that and they really don't go on to it, and while it doesn't hurt to have it out, it isn't really helping much. Of course a lot will depend on pasture condition. If your pastures are pretty dry, they will go onto it sooner and faster, if they are really lush and green it will take them longer to go on. All we have ever used is whole oats.

The type of calves you have is one thing to really keep in mind. Big, framey, long bodied calves lend themselves to creepfeeding much better than smaller framed, shorter bodied calves do. The smaller framed calves tend to turn into real butter balls and if you are planning to sell them at weaning, that is usually a real detriment. The buyers want frame, not fat.

Another thing to keep in mind it replacement heifers. I have read studies where it showed that creep feeding replacements can cause them to deposit fat in their udders and lead to reduced milking ability as cows. Of course, if you look long enough you can probably find studies that say the opposite :? . I tend to lean on the side of caution and we like to separate any heifers that we consider replacements and keep them off the creep feed.

Some years it pays to creep and some years you are better off not doing it. Be sure to crunch your numbers and see if you are getting ahead by doing so. You can expect about a 50lb advantage (in our area anyways) by creep feeding, know your grain cost and your calf prices before you do it or you may find yourself losing money. Of course, another thing to consider here is cow condition. Creep feeding can help your cows out too, and it is cheaper to feed calves some grain than to have to feed it to your cows. But in this case early weaning might be an option to consider.

Hope this helps, and gives you some ideas.
 
Per, that is sometimes not an option especially in a drought. :wink:

What is the end result you want to creep feed for sunnyside ? There are many differnts times and reason people start to creep thus we need a little more info.
 
Well, we fall calve in mid september through october, so there's really no pasture grass to speak of other than grass hay bales. I figured that creep feeding was necessary to grow a good calf. Also, most of our calves are fairly big framed and bred to a gelbvieh bull.
 
Sunnyside Stock Farm said:
Well, we fall calve in mid september through october, so there's really no pasture grass to speak of other than grass hay bales. I figured that creep feeding was necessary to grow a good calf. Also, most of our calves are fairly big framed and bred to a gelbvieh bull.
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It will definitely help but I find that GV calves want to grow and fatten even in tough conditions. I think if you have good quality hay and it is a reasonable cost you will be fine without creep but if you have poor quality or very expensive hay then you might find a creep ration helpful for the calves which in turn will help the cows. I would start them when they are 6-8 weeks old as that is when the cow will be coming into peek milk and will be getting ready to be rebred soon.
 
Fall calveing In Minnesota you need top quality hay and creep feeding would'nt hurt. A couple neighbors fall calve one has pretty good hay and creep feeds calves wean off near 700#s may 1st. The other has top quality baleage alfalfa or barley baleage his wean off near 700#s also. Mine get gut rot hay and dont grow out very well. I cured my problem and sold all the late calvers.

I do know both of these guys claim water very close as the cows wont walk for it in bitter cold weather no water ='s no milk..
 

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