Building healthy herds begins at birth. All our calves are with us from the day they are born through their last day.
We’ve found that a solid foundation of health is crucial in maintaining health, especially respiratory health, as they grow and encounter stress events. Our birth processing protocol has been developed with our veterinarian who knows exactly which challenges we face and with that, drum roll please! …9 Items I use to process newborn calves:
Caddy: it all starts here. This is the handiest way I’ve found to tote supplies around and be able to grab them quickly.
Tagger: every calf gets tagged with its own number beginning with the year they were born and the number calf they are. For example, the first calf born in 2024 will be 4001. Above the calf number we write the mother’s number and above that the sire.
Tags: each color indicates different ownership or group, but this is our go to brand. It’s not super pretty for those of us that like uniformity, but when driving through all the cows it sure helps narrow it down if I only have to look for one color rather than look at every tag. Heifer calves are tagged in the left and steers in the right.
Bander: we band all the bull calves at birth. The one linked is the exact one that we have, but has great reviews!
Bands: keeping these in the fridge seems to help keep them fresh for us!
Ultrabac® CD: we’ve worked with a veterinarian to establish a protocol that works best for our operation. The C&D at our birth processing is a part of this.
18g needle/syringe combo: LIFE CHANGING! These are amazing. Once you feel the difference of the 18g needle you’ll know. I fill one for each calf we have to process and it’s so nice having them all ready to go.
Inforce 3® nasal: our calves are with us from birth through the end of their lives. We’ve found that building a solid foundation of health from the beginning is crucial in maintaining health as they age.
Cannula/syringe: every calf gets a fresh cannula when they receive their nasal. I mix up however many we have to do at a time, then they are all ready to go alongside the shot.
What’s your favorite calving processing step?!
Visit BuidingHealthyHerds.com to learn more about herd health and prevention ahead of calving season.
