Use of a Calving Blind That Imitates a Natural Environment.

Many indoor-housed cows isolate at calving when given the opportunity, and calving behaviors vary by blind and pen design. The objectives of this study were to determine if cows preferred calving in a visibly separated (blind) or an open area of a group maternity pen, and if there was a preference for the degree of seclusion provided by the blind (50% vs. 100% coverage).

Investigating nutritional strategies during a rest period to improve health, growth, and behavioral outcomes of transported surplus dairy calves.

The objective of this study was to investigate the effects of feeding surplus dairy calves a milk replacer (MR) or one of 2 different oral rehydration solutions (ORS) during a midtransportation rest period on metabolic and clinical health indicators, growth, and behavioral outcomes after arrival at a calf-raising facility. Surplus dairy calves (n = 128) were transported in 4 cohorts from February to July 2022 for 12 h to a holding facility, rested for 8 h, then transported for an additional 6 h to a calf-raising facility. Upon arrival at the holding facility, calves were randomly assigned to 1 of 3 treatments: MR (n = 43), a high-sodium ORS developed for diarrhea (ORS-D; n = 43), or a high-potassium ORS developed for transportation (ORS-T; n = 42).

The development and validation of a milk feeding behavior alert from automated feeder data to classify calves at risk for a diarrhea bout: A diagnostic accuracy study.

The objective of this diagnostic accuracy study was to develop and validate an alert to identify calves at risk for a diarrhea bout using milk feeding behavior data (behavior) from automated milk feeders (AMF). We enrolled Holstein calves (n = 259) as a convenience sample size from 2 facilities that were health scored daily preweaning and offered either 10 or 15 L/d of milk replacer. For alert development, 132 calves were enrolled and the ability of milk intake, drinking speed, and rewarded visits collected from AMF to identify calves at risk for diarrhea was tested.