Køer med kalve. Learn about benefits and challenges of new cow-calf-togetherness systems

Summary

For many decades, it has been common practice to separate calves from their mothers just after birth so the cows can be milked. This practice contains a dilemma for organic dairy farms because naturalness is considered as part of the organic animal welfare definition. Furthermore, the dilemma has increasingly awakened the attention of farmers and other parties as well.
In this film you can listen to experts and practitioners from the fields of organic farming, animal welfare and milk production talk about the experiences, benefits, and challenges combined with calves living together with their mothers. Among other things, the video covers topics such as gentle separation, the rhythm of having the calves on the grass fields, and health-promoting care.
The film takes place at a dairy farm, where the herd of cows and calves are being together on the third year and is one of the herds that the Danish cow-calf projects follow. During these years, the farm crew has worked on creating a system, where the cow-calf meeting can take place during the milk-feeding period in a safe and sustainable way for calves, cows, and humans.
The video is produced by Den Grimme Ølling Aps and is part of the international CORE Organic research project GrazyDaiSy and the Danish Organic RDD 4 research project KALVvedKO.
Learn more about the CORE Organic project GrazyDaiSy: https://projects.au.dk/coreorganiccof...
Learn more about the Organic RDD 4 research project KALVvedKO: https://icrofs.dk/forskning/dansk-for...