Insättningsålderns påverkan på kalvens hälsa i gruppbox
In modern dairy production, the newborn calf generally is separated from its mother and put in a single pen for some time before it is introduced to group housing. Group housing is becoming more and more common because it saves the farmer a lot of valuable time. Even thought group housing has a lot of benefits it is often associated with a higher morbidity and mortality in the young calves. Therefore, knowing the optimal way to use the group pen lies in many farmers? interests and the importance of different factors such as the optimal age of introduction is important to evaluate.
The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of age at introduction to group housing on the health of the calves in the group pen.
The calves that were used in the study were divided into two groups depending on their age at introduction to group housing. Group 1 consisted of 51 calves that where introduced at 7-17 days of age. Group 2 consisted of 47 calves that were introduced at 18-38 days of age. The calves where monitored by clinical examinations every other to third day during the time from introduction until weaning. During this time they also were equipped with a pedometer that registered their daily activity.
The different variables that were examined were; incidence of diseases defined on the basis of the clinical examinations, proportion of days with illness and days without illness in group housing, activity and time to first illness.
Numerically, the study showed a bigger proportion of sick calves, calves with diarrhea and calves with respiratory disease in group 2. This group also had a higher proportion of days with illness and lower proportion of healthy days, also the activity was lower. However, none of these results were statistically significant.