How do you wean alpacas?

Answer 1

At about 2 months old start feeding a light grain along with the 2 daily feedings. Go down to one full bottle feeding and a half bottle feeding with grain for a week. Then just one bottle feeding and a full grain with hay feeding for a week. Then a half bottle feeding with grain and hay until the bottle is taken away. The calf should be weaned by the 4th week. This should take a month. Be your own judge of how much the calf eats solids, if it eats well, you can take away the bottle sooner. If the calf bawlks a lot, do it slower.

Answer 2

This might take a bit of time and may seem a little harsh but it works. Take hold of your puppy and hold it round the head. Then stick it's nose into a bowl of dog food. Hold it the for about 3 to 5 seconds then pull it back again. Do this a few time a day to wean your pup.

Answer 3

There are several methods out there that are at your disposal to wean a calf:

1. Spiked nose-ring with the spikes pointing outward that is placed in the calf's nose (no need to poke any holes in between the calf's nostrils because it is a temporary tool). Calf and mother does not need to be separated; the nose ring takes advantage natural weaning by encouraging the cow to kick at the calf if he tries to nurse. Works 95% of the time, and is THE less stressful method of weaning.

2. Fence-line weaning: Calves are placed on one side of a fence and the cows on another. Calves and cows are able to smell/see each other but not allow them to nurse. Fences have to be in good shape and strong to prevent any "smart" calves or cows that figure away to get back to their mother or son/daughter, respectively. Less stress on cows and calves, but not as #1.

3. Separate pasture weaning: Similar to #2 only the cows and calves are farther away from each other, by a few hundred yards to a mile or so. Often this is done so that cows and calves cannot hear nor see each other.

4. Selling calves right off the cows: Similar to #2 and #3, except the calves are separated from their mommas and put on a cattle liner to be shipped to another farm that has bought them for backgrounding them up prior to being sent to the feedlot prior to being slaughtered for beef. Works 100% of the time, but least recommended method because of increased stress on both cows and calves, creating higher potential for sickness to occur.

Answer 4

Technically, mama dog weans the pups, but you can help things along by watching the mother dog and following her lead.

At first, mom will let the pups nurse to their hearts' content. When you notice that she's beginning to get up and walk away while the pups are still trying to nurse, that's a sign that she's begun the weaning process. By four weeks of age, you need to make some puppy food available. If you give them dry food, you might moisten it a bit at first. (You might want a video camera handy too...a litter of puppies' first encounter with a pan of puppy food is often hilarious!)

Over the following few weeks she'll let them nurse less and less, and they'll eat more and more. Finally, the mama dog will refuse to let them nurse (usually at 6-7 weeks). You want them to be well accustomed to their food by this point, because mama can be sternly insistent when she decides that it's time for them to go without nursing, to the point of growling or possibly even biting to make them stop trying. That's it...they're weaned.

Answer 5

You do not wean newborn rabbits! Rabbits are not weaned from their mom until they are 6 to 8 weeks old. You start by removing one or two of the larger bunnies from the mom and putting them in a separate cage. You take one or two every day until all are in a separate cage and the mother is alone and has time to recuperate from her child rearing session. You do it gradually so that your doe will not get mastitis from too much milk.

Answer 6

Usually the mother can let you know when, she will let the foal nurse less and less, watch for this and add more feed for the foal to eat when it eats. This will help the weaning process.

Answer 7

soften the puppy food in water until its spongy and put to food on a plate or something easy for the puppies to get to.

Answer 8

Weaning lasts from a few days to 6 weeks. The recommended amount of time to wean a calf is at least 4 to 6 weeks.