134 REARING CALVES. 



makes it peculiarly appropriate food for calves ; difiused in water, it 

 ill fact bears a close resemblance to milk in point of chemical com- 

 position. It is now, too, that the calf begins to play with a little 

 hay, so that it is always advisable to place some within his reach, 

 the finest and softest portions being picked out. 



But it is by no means necessary that the calf should ever be allow- 

 ed to suck ; it drinks without difficulty, or can be made to drink, as 

 every dairy man and woman knows, by putting a finger or two into 

 the animal's mouth under the surface of the drink. A little warm 

 water is added to the milk during the first few days, in order to give 

 it due warmth. Some begin from the very first to measure the 

 milk ; but those who are best informed upon the subject of breeding 

 and rearing do nothing of the kind. Crud allows his calves to drink 

 as much milk as they will take for the first week After this time 

 they have an allowance of about seven pints of new milk mixed with 

 the same quantity of fresh whey. They are weaned at seven weeks. 

 From the age of between nine and ten weeks to a year, a calf will 

 consume about a fourth of the ration of a grown cow, say 6^ lbs. of 

 hay per diem. During the second year, the allowance of hay may 

 be estimated at about 13 lbs., or a little more ; and in the third year 

 it will amount to between 19 and 20 lbs. This is to be understood 

 of cattle brought up carefully but frugally. 



In some of the best dairies of Switzerland, the procedure is different. 

 During the first six weeks the calves are allowed to drink as much 

 milk as they will take without a surfeit. At a month old, they are 

 served with chopped hay and roots, or better still, if the season ad- 

 mits of it, with green clover or lucern, which they have at discretion 

 till they are seventy days old. Treated in this way, a calf is nearly 

 twice as large and twice as heavy as one that has been brought up 

 economically. During the remaining 295 days that make up the 

 first year, the animal is allowed from 8 to 9 lbs. of hay ; and this 

 quantity is doubled during the second year. By proceeding in this 

 way, a heifer at two years old may herself be a mother and contri- 

 buting to the produce of the dairy. 



Our procedure at Bechelbronn is calculated on the Swiss plan. 

 The cfUves suck till they are six or seven weeks old, being put to 

 the cows night and morning. Any thing they leave is milked off. 

 After numerous trials by gauging and weighing, I find that our 

 calves take each during the forty-two days they are allowed to suck, 

 from 528 to 600 pints of milk ; in other words, from 14^ to 18| pints 

 per diem. The quantit;^ of milk which a calf takes immediately 

 after its birth, does not indeed amount to any thing like even the 

 smaller of these quantities ; still it is considerable. 



A calf which weighed at its birth on the 18th of May 108.9 lbs., 

 after having sucked, weighed 112.4 lbs. ; so that it had taken 3.5 lbs. 

 of milk to its meal ; and as it had two of these in the day, 7.0 lbs. 

 in all. The same calf, thirteen days afterwards, weighed 130.9 lbs ; 

 and after having sucked, 139.0 lbs. ; it had therefore taken 8.1 lbs. 

 to its meal, or 16.2 lbs. per day. 



About the third week after birth, our calves have hay of the best 



