Lyn Smith (Kingspool Holsteins) of the Heifer Rearer of the Year Award 2011

12 September 2011

Lyn Smith (Kingspool Holsteins), Gloucestershire

What the judges liked

Well defined standard operating procedures
Low mortality to first calving
Extremely high levels of hygiene in calf housing
Excellent growth maintained through to first service    

Lyn Smith has reared calves in many different systems. “They’ve all helped towards getting the heifers off to the best possible start, however in my opinion, the most important factors to successful rearing are plenty of high quality colostrum, a clean hygienic and healthy environment, and adhering to standard operating procedures (SOPs), coupled with plenty of loving care.”

Lyn manages the calf rearing unit for the 330 pedigree cow Kingspool herd at Two Pools Farm, Iron Action, Bristol. Since she took over the position in November 2009, she introduced a number of changes which have subsequently led to improved growth rates and ultimately average age at first service has fallen by more than five weeks to 15.2 months resulting in 1.3 services per conception and 2.1 years average age at first calving. Mortality from birth to first calving is running at 4%.

“They included injecting every cow with rotavirus vaccine and feeding the colostrum to her calf – three litres within the first six hours and another three litres within 12 to 18 hours. All colostrum is tested for quality with a colostometer. The volume of milk fed is stepped up from four litres, to five litres and six litres daily at three weeks,” she explains. “Calves are weaned at 10 weeks provided they are eating 2kg concentrate daily. Racks of hay have replaced barley straw which is encouraging more concentrate to be eaten.

“However it’s that attention to detail that’s also critical; making sure everyone involved in the calf unit follows my SOPs and maintains a very strict routine,” she says. Lyn has introduced three separate protocols - for new born, feeding and sick calves.

The new born calf protocol begins with pen preparation and adequate bedding, removing the calf from its dam, weighing with a weigh band, a senior member of staff stomach tubing its dam’s colostrum followed by bucket training to drink two litres of pasteurised milk per feed for the first two weeks.

The calf feeding protocol evolves around specific quantities of milk and concentrate fed to each calf according to age depicted by Lyn’s colour coding system marked on each pen and a whiteboard. Strict hygiene is woven throughout the protocol. Finally the sick calf protocol features symptoms and necessary actions for mild, medium and serious scours and pneumonia.

Lyn adds: “Taking every precaution to preventing calves becoming ill enables them to get off to that good start and towards a strong healthy heifer, and a return on investment when they enter the milking herd.”

Chris Price, Drove Vets

Kings Pool Farm operates a simple but extremely effective system which is achieving excellent results. Colostrum management protocols and hygiene in the rearing environment ensure levels of disease are minimal. Attention to detail with calf nutritional management and monitoring of calf growth and performance ensures that batches of calves are evenly sized and well grown for their age. The quality of the current maiden heifer group is testament to a job well done during the rearing phase, achieving correct body size, stature and condition score for service from around 12 months of age.

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