THE IMPACT OF MANAGING REARING CALVES ON THEIR PERFORMANCE IN A COMMERCIAL HOLSTEIN FRIESIAN FARM

Abstract

This study was conducted in a commercial cattle farm named El-Baiomy dairy farm located in GamasaDakahlia province-Egypt to evaluate the effect of management system on calves performance. Records of 3691 Holstein Friesian calves were used in this study from 2013 up to 2019. This study included management factors such as dam effect (dry period, parity, calving interval and previous milk production) and calves management (housing system, suckling system, season and gender) and their effects on birth weight (kg), weaning weight (kg), weaning age (day) and daily gain (kg). There was significant effect (P ≤ 0.05) of housing system, suckling system and season of calving on weaning age and daily gain of calves. The lowest birth weight was reported in winter (31.34 kg) however, the heaviest one was reported in winter (93.88 kg). The heaviest birth weight was reported in male (32.93 kg) but female was 31.63 kg only. On the other hand weaning age found to be 81.31 and 79.14 days in female and male, respectively. There were no significant effects (P˃ 0.05) in dry period length, parity, calving interval and previous milk production of dam on calf's performance. The lowest birth weight was found to be in first parity cows (31.63 kg), while the heaviest one was found to be in third parity cows (33.00 kg).