Question: My daughter purchased an 8 month old heifer, little high strung, having hard time finding anyone in the area who carries a complete feed product geared towards show heifers. We do have ground corn but so far she turns her nose up at anything mixed or given to her separate (just 40% w/o concentrate that we feed out bred cows) she is losing weight at the time we need her to put it on. Has been vetted with no apparent reason to be picky.
Answer: Beth, Thank you for contacting the Honor Show Chow Website! How long has she been weaned? First, we need to find someone that will supply you with the needed products. Please visit www.HonorShowChow.com again and type your zip code into the dealer locator. You should find your nearest dealer locations. Please click on Advanced Search and change the miles from 25 to 50. You will find several more options. I would encourage you to give them a call to inquire about product availability. I assume you have a fairly large amount of fine material when using your ground corn ingredient. I think that can explain a large portion of your feed refusal situation. How much hay are you feeding? I would offer free choice medium quality grass hay. Do you have any other calves in the same pen? That MIGHT help with the docility concerns and might improve her feed consumption. I would recommend feeding her our Preconditioning/Receiving Chow for 7 to 10 days. Feed 10 to 15 lb/hd/d (half in the am; half in the pm). Then transition her over to our HSC Fitters Edge as follows: 75% Preconditioning/Receiving Chow:25% HSC Fitters Edge for 3 to 5 days 50% Preconditioning/Receiving Chow:50% HSC Fitters Edge for 3 to 5 days 25% Preconditioning/Receiving Chow:75% HSC Fitters Edge for 3 to 5 days 100% HSC Fitters Edge for 3 to 5 days 15 lb of PCRC for 10 days is 150 pounds 11.25 lb of PCRC for 3 days is 33.75 pounds 7.5 lb of PCRC for 3 days is 22.50 pounds 3.75 lb of PCRC for 3 days is 11.25 pounds TOTAL: 217.5 or 5 bags of Preconditioning/Receiving Chow needed. Please make sure she has clean, fresh water. Once she is consuming feed good, we can then add some (1 lb/hd/d) of our High Octane Power Fuel to help increase her weight gain. Please let me know if you have any additional questions or concerns. GOOD LUCK! Steven E. Myers, Ph.D. Land O’Lakes Purina Feed LLC Consulting Beef Nutritionist
