The experiment was carried out with 20 intact Holsteins male calves, average live weight of 75 kg and 76 days old, to evaluate the performance and the economical viability to produce veal calves. The calves were fed diets containing 45, 60, 75 and 90% of concentrate. Diets were composed of coastcross hay, ground corn, soybean meal and mineral mixture, fed ad libitum. The experimental design was a complete randomized blocks, with four treatments and five replicates. Before the beginning of the experiment, all the animals were submitted to the same nursing system. The experimental period was different for each treatment, since the animals were slaughtered as they reached an average weight of 200 kg. The variance analyses for dry matter and crude protein intake and dry matter conversion showed no significant effect of the concentrate levels in the diets. However, the regression analyses showed a decreasing linear effect as the concentrate level for the neutral detergent fiber intake increased, and a linear increase in the average daily gain, reducing in 35 days of feedlot for the animals fed 90% of concentrate. Significant effects due to the concentrate level were also observed for neutral detergent fiber and crude protein feed:gain ratio, and the improvement of the feed efficiency occurred as the concentrate level in the diet increased. The production costs analysis showed the viability to produce veal calves from Holstein bull calves.
Holstein calves; levels of concentrate; performance; production cost; veal calves
