By Dr. Robert Tremblay, Veterinarian

Until recently, the veal industry in Ontario was made up of two sectors, milk-fed veal and grain-fed veal. With both these types of veal production, the calves are fed for several months before being slaughtered for food. In the U.S. there has been a third type of veal production called bob veal. Bob veal calves are slaughtered for food not at a few months but at a few weeks of age. Bob veal production hasn’t been very common in Ontario but this seems to be changing. There now appears to be a significant number of young bull calves that are being slaughtered in provincially-inspected abattoirs and sold as veal.

The emergence of a bob veal industry means that dairy farmers will need to be careful with how they manage bull calves. Until now, dairy farmers may have come to rely on the fact that bull calves wouldn’t be slaughtered for food for months after they left the dairy farm. They may not have been as careful about the types of treatment that these calves were given on the dairy farm. They may not have even recorded the treatments that they gave bull calves. That will have to change.

Whenever a calf is sold in Ontario and Quebec, it will be possible that the calf will be slaughtered for food within a few days to weeks after it leaves the farm. Dairy farmers will need to find out what the meat withdrawals are for the treatments they give calves. They will also need to keep track of any treatments and either hold the calf until the meat withdrawal period is over or pass the treatment information along when the calf is sold. For dairies on the CQM program, all these steps are compulsory.

Dairy farmers are pretty mindful that livestock medicines have milk withhold times. They may not be quite so aware that they also have meat withhold times. This is especially true for medicines used to treat calves. Some of the calf medicines can have very long withhold times. If a dairy farmer gives a scour bolus to a calf, the withdrawal for meat is often a month or longer. There are long meat withdrawal times for many of the treatments commonly used on calves. Some pneumonia drugs have meat withdrawal times as long as 48 days. Even drugs, like Excenel, that have no withdrawal for milk have a withdrawal for meat.

In the United States, the bob veal industry has traditionally had a high rate of inhibitor violations in the meat at slaughter. Mature dairy cows also have a higher rate of inhibitor violations than other types of beef. As a result, OMAFRA is wise to be extra-vigilant of bob veal when these calves are slaughtered in provincially-inspected abattoirs.