Newborn Calf Care: Calf Navel Dipping

Dr. Steve Hayes gives a step-by-step demonstration of how to properly perform an iodine dip on a new calf to prevent navel infection.

- Today we're gonna spend some time,

I've been asked by APC Lifeline

to discuss different
topics related to calves.

Sanitation, management,
nutrition, different things

that we can do that will
help us all raise calves

in a better manner.

What we wanna do is just take
a little time and talk about

dipping the navel or the
umbilical cord of the calf.

So we've got a brand new calf here,

it's about 12 hours, 24 hours old.

And typically what we'll
wanna do is dip that navel

with the 7% iodine, there
are some other products

on the market that could
be also used as well.

But we wanna use a product
that's proven to work

for disinfection of the navel.

Now it's important to
remember, why we do that.

And as we look at this
calf, this umbilical cord

is what's been feeding the
calf, while it was in the cow.

There was nothing going in
the mouth, it was all going

through the umbilical cord,
which is how the nutrients.

So this is a pipeline into
the entire system of the calf

into the blood, into the liver.

All sorts of things.

This is a pipeline.

And so what we wanna do is
make sure that we don't wick

any manure or bacteria into the calf.

And because of that, we use a navel dip

to go ahead and try to disinfect it,

so that it doesn't do that.

And so.

This is an example of using
the Dixie cup concept.

We'll go ahead and put this
to navel, into the cup.

We'll go ahead and

rub the material onto the navel.

And then you can see,
that we've completely

dipped it and as a result
we've got a chance to try

and prevent infections from happening.

Thanks for your time today.

I really appreciate it.

Feel free to watch our other videos.

Hopefully we've been able to provide you

at least one good idea to
help you raise a better calf.

Thanks.