ANN 121: Applied Animal Nutrition-I (2+1)

FEEDING OF GOATS

• Mostly the goats are kept with the sheep in mixed flocks where sheep graze the grass and goats browse the shrubs and do not compete for feed.
• The dry matter intake varies according to the energy density of the diet and the physical character of the roughage, with a mean of 70 g/kg metabolic weight or 3 - 3.5 % of the body weight.
• The goats usually prefer tree leaves, small branches, weeds, herbs etc in the natural grazing conditions, but they also consume cultivated fodder like berseem, lucerne, cowpea, subabul, grasses, hays and silage under stall fed conditions.
• Normally about 70 - 80 % of DM intake consists of the leaves of shrubs and bushes.
• Depending upon the vegetation, goats are able to secure their nutritional needs by grazing/browsing and the ecological environment has a greater role to govern the feeding habits of goats.

• During the last quarter of pregnancy in addition to grazing, about 250 g of concentrate mixture will be needed to balance the nutritional requirement.
• The goats produce between 300-400g of milk daily, which is just sufficient for the twin kids with no supplement of concentrate.
• However, good milch breeds like Barbari, Jamunapari, Beetal etc may produce around 1.0-1.5 kg of milk/day which can be used for human consumption after supplying the requirements of kids. The kids start nibbling the grasses as early as 15 days of age.
• Goats generally relish green leaves and pods of shrubs and trees such as Acacia.
• Tree leaves such as Agathi, Soobabul,  Gliricidia, Neem and vegetable wastes are commonly used for feeding of goats.