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New calf housing slashes antibiotic use

An 80% reduction in antibiotic usage has been achieved by a Sussex calf rearer since changing his housing system.

 Written by: Martin Looker – BHR Communications

Mark Peters of Plashett Park Farm, Ringmer, near Lewes, has between 1,200 and 1,400 mixed breed calves which he rears from 2-3 weeks old through to finish, but 70 percent leave at 170-200 kg.

Previously, the calves were loose-housed in
‘old sheds’ with hurdle divisions, but Mr Peters
decided to put up a new steel-framed 66m x 10m
mono-pitch building with 10 pens, each housing
20 calves.

The pens, designed by Mr Peters and the steel erector, have Yorkshire boarding at the rear and are open at the front to provide good ventilation, which is important for young calves.


The first phase of this project was completed in
October 2022, and for reasons of hygiene, instead
of hurdles, Mr Peters used solid plastic Paneltim
pen dividers, supplied by Quality Equipment in his 6m x 9m pens.

These, he said, provided “100% clean break
between pens and are not cold in winter”.
Although similar in price, these were chosen
in preference to concrete divisions as they were
much easier to clean and could be removed if
necessary.

One of Mark Peter’s new mono-pitch calf houses holding up to 200 calves in ten pens.
The hygienic Paneltim pen divisions have helped control the spread of pneumonia resulting in reduced the use of antibiotics and increased daily liveweight gain, says Mark.

Mr Peters is convinced that the new divisions have
had a major bearing on calf health. “We had issues
with pneumonia in the old shed, but we’ve not had
any spread of infections since putting in the solid
divisions,” he said. In addition, hygiene has improved and because the divisions are easier to clean, pen cleaning between batches takes half the time, he says.

“We have always avoided in-feed antibiotics
which, at times, has meant that we’ve used more
injectables, but this has now reduced significantly.
We are only doing individual treatments
in the new shed instead of the full treatments
that were necessary when there were health
issues in the old sheds. This is exactly why we
went away from large batch rearing.”
The calves are vaccinated against pneumonia
on arrival and kept in the same groups for
seven weeks. In the old sheds, they were gaining
0.7-1 kg per day while in the new sheds they
gain 0.9-1.2 kg per day.

Mark Peters was so pleased with the first phase
of the development that he decided to add a second building in June 2024. In addition to using
less antibiotics, compared with his old pens, he
says the calves are 10-15 kg heavier when weaned.

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