Feeding questions.

Shayanna · #1 11/21/12, 08:20 AM

I'm not sure exactly how much to feed the goats. We have four 100-150 lb goats, 3 does and our buck. We cannot feed separately based on our facilities. However, we have 2 4-foot goat grain troughs along the wall of one of their sheds, that way they have a chance of all getting grain. We have a large igloo cooler set in the middle of their shed for hay so that they all have access. The grain we feed is an all purpose mix (we made sure it was the kind without the animal fat and preservative crap,) and the hay we have is mostly grass with some alfalfa I guess. (I don't know how to tell how much alfalfa is in it.) They still have 10 acres of browse, with lots of cedar and pine, and old apple trees, which they love the bark off of, and cattail plants and other "near-water" vegetation along the creek.
If we keep the hay cooler full, they won't go outside. Especially Billy. So between the four of them, how much grain should I be putting out a day and how many times should we fill the hay feeder? I don't want fat lazy goats. Only one doe is pregnant, and due in a couple weeks. And when the snow flies, should I free feed? Will this make them too fat?
Another thing I should mention is it was cheaper for us to get round bales rather than square, so we don't really have an easy way to measure the hay or weigh it.

Sarah J · #2 11/21/12, 08:31 AM

Interesting question. I never fed grain to any of my goats unless they were on the milk stand. BUT I also had them on a dry lot with free feed alfalfa hay. The buck was kept separately and fed only a good quality grass hay (and they all had a loose mineral feeder). I got out of goats about 18 months ago and now have sheep and Dexter cattle on a 10 acre unimproved pasture. They get hay only when the pasture is gone, but I have a rotating system (the pasture is divided into three sections) so the pasture manages well from about the end of April thru December.

So I guess MY answer would be, why are you feeding the grain? Are these meat goats being finished for the butcher? Is the browse nutritionally deficient in a way that requires the extra? Or is it just that it is expected? I had a hard time convincing most of the people in my area that the grain wasn't necessary... It's the way they were told/ taught. It can also be much more convenient in some ways to feed grain.

Sooooo...more input into the how,why, breed and purpose of the goats?

CaliannG · #3 11/21/12, 08:50 AM

Pregnant and milking does need grain, and bucks ONLY when they are in rut. For pregnant and milking does, grain should be fed on the milkstand, so you are *positive* they are getting their share. It doesn't take long to feed a pregnant doe....she will scarf down her pound or two of grain in less than 5 minutes.

With 10 acres of pasture and browse available to them, plus all-they-can-eat hay, I would not be putting grain out for them. They have plenty to eat unless they have extra demands on their body, such as pregnancy and milking....and then, I would feed the ones that NEED grain completely separately.

Why pour out grain to a bunch of goats that don't need it, while your pregnant (and likely slow-moving) doe actually DOES need it and is probably getting pushed aside because she is not as light on her feet? Just take her out twice a day for five minutes and give her HER grain, and the other little piggies can go browse.

**mygoat** · #4 11/21/12, 09:00 AM

Does need grain for the last 50 days of pregnancy to reduce cases of ketosis. You need them on a positive energy intake as much as possible. This can get tricky with multiples - the doe can only hold so much food when a bunch of space is being taken up by growing kids. Thus, to get the proper energy intake you should feed more energy dense foods and enough fiber/rich hay to meet demands.

Before this 50 days, goats can be fed a maintenance diet - decent free choice hay, minerals, baking soda, water.

Though it's not popular on this forum, I favor a LOW calcium diet for does prior to kidding, increasing calcium after kidding to promote good calcium homeostasis. The reason hypocalcemia occurs is NOT because of calcium defeciency in the diet generally, but much more usual that it is caused by a failure of Calcium homeostasis and mobilization from the bones during increased need.

Shayanna · #5 11/21/12, 09:03 AM

2 does are mostly Nubian mixed with a little toggenburg. 1 doe is Alpine. The buck is a large fainter. We are breeding to get meaty babies and milk from the does. I don't think the land is deficient. It hasn't been really "farmed" in atleast 100 years (its been in our family for that long), except for 2 or three cows every couple years for the past 20 years. I was under the impression that frost decreases nutritional value in the vegetation but this could be wrong. And with us letting them breed when they so choose, we are never really 100% sure who is pregnant and who isn't. But I'm thinking Onyx is in heat cause she's been awfully cuddly, and Paisley is flagging around like crazy so she is probably too... So we could probably separate Birdie easily enough. And this is good to know as now we can save a little money on grain. Thanks. I just don't want to over feed and throw away money. I'm pretty frugal.

Shayanna · #6 11/21/12, 09:15 AM

But I will say that Birdie does not take no for an answer when we have been putting the grain out. She's quite the scrapper for a goat without horns...

**mygoat** · #7 11/21/12, 09:17 AM

Does *generally* start developing an udder 6 weeks pre-kidding. It is palpable about then, but usually pretty visually obvious about 4 weeks pre kidding.

If *nothing* else, I suggest upping grain for those who are showing an udder, and just monitor them by palpating for udder development. Good way to get a vague idea of duedate too... I can't stand not knowing duedates, lol.

Shayanna · #8 11/21/12, 09:22 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mygoat

Good way to get a vague idea of duedate too... I can't stand not knowing duedates, lol.

and how much udder development are we talking?

Now I read somewhere that if a doe has freshened before, the udder development may happen later than if it is a first freshener?

Paisley, Birdie's daughter, will be a FF whenever she does or if she is pg. And I have noticed that her teats are getting larger, but no udder... I don't know what this means. Is it maybe like goat puberty? or is it a sign of pregnancy.

LoneStrChic23 · #9 11/21/12, 09:22 AM

I'd skip filling the grain trough. You are wasting money feeding grain to those who don't need it.

Feed your pregnant girl on the milk stand. Roll your round bale out & wrap it in a cattle panel so they can't jump on it and waste it (I drive 2 t-post on opposite sides of a round, wrap the panel around and wire it to the t-post- easy, cheap round bale feeder). Let them have their round bale, minerals & browse 24/7.

Growing babies, pregnant girls & milking girls are the only ones who get grain here..... Bucks get a small amount during rut, but no more than 1/2lb a day and they only get it until everyone is bred.

Shayanna · #10 11/21/12, 09:29 AM

[QUOTE=LoneStrChic23;6275834]
Roll your round bale out & wrap it in a cattle panel so they can't jump on it and waste it (I drive 2 t-post on opposite sides of a round, wrap the panel around and wire it to the t-post- easy, cheap round bale feeder). Let them have their round bale, minerals & browse 24/7.
QUOTE]
Can't do that unfortunately. My mother's cow and horse share the pasture, and she feeds those two over on their side, and I refuse to feed her horse/cow with the hay WE bought.

Sorry if I sound snippy. I despise this horse. If my mom ever forgets to feed the horse, the stupid (or way too smart) mare guards the back door to the goat shed. (We made it so she can't fit in.) My mother actually gave me permission to post her horse on Craigslist this summer for 300, but you can barely give horses away right now.

Anybody want an Appaloosa?

CaliannG · #11 11/21/12, 10:39 AM

Shayanna, on land being deficient:

The last time the land out here was used for anything but grazing cattle was a century ago, when it was EXTENSIVELY farmed for corn and cotton. In less than 40 years, those farmers managed to deplete the soil so that it was useful for *nothing more* than grazing cattle.

100 years later, and most of the land around here is still useless for anything but pasture...and people growing hay have to fertilize regularly. Realize that before that influx of bright-eyed farmers around 150 years ago, the Blacklands Prairies out here were RICH. Farmers in the late 1800's wrote about how easy it was to grow anything you wanted on it.

Now, it is nearly a wasteland. The rich, reddish-black soils are still depleted to a pasty, grayish clay. Only plants that thrive in poor nutrient soils thrive unless chemical fertilizers are sprayed. The top soil is mineral deficient.

But... it has been a CENTURY since anyone has farmed here! It doesn't matter. It takes thousands of years for the earth to replace a single inch of topsoil, not the mention the FEET of soil used up and destroyed by those long ago farmers.

Just because your family's land hasn't been used in a 100 years doesn't mean that it has good soil. Your family stopped farming it for a reason, and it is highly doubtful that the reason was that they got bored with it. If that was the case, they would have leased it to other farmers for crop growing. No, more than likely, they quite farming because the soil had gotten depleted and would no longer support enough crops to be profitable.

That being the case, unless you family has spent 100 years working faithfully on restoring the soil to its former glory, bringing in thousands of pounds of compost and organic waste to amend it, tilling such humus in, over years and years and years, while irrigating with unfiltered shallow well water to bring up minerals from the sub-strates...then your soil is STILL mineral and nutritionally depleted.

Land laying fallow for decades does not magically make the soil good again. Keep that in mind when considering your goat's mineral needs.

Donna1982 · #12 11/21/12, 11:21 AM

Argh I hate computers first of all. I had typed out a long answer and lost it.

So here we go again. I mix up 3 to 4 butter containers of my feed. Which is whole oats, BOSS, and 16 % high gain. I top dress it with calcium carbonate. This is shared between 10 goats (8 lbs of grain). Seven of my 10 are pregnant does due anywhere from Jan to March. Each goat has a feeder on the fence and I tie each goat up to (unless milking they are on the stand) and they get a little grain. The two wethers get a scoop (maybe 1/2 cup) the the Boer doe due in March and GoGurt due the end of Jan gets a scoop and half, the two youngest girls, Monkey and the two does and the two due in Jan get two scoops also. My buckling gets two scoops and beet pulp (hes to thin due to rut). They get as much browse as I can let them, we've been having hunter and dog issues here. So I cut down trees, and give them hay also. So far this works for us and everyone is healthy and growing like weeds. Once the girls all are in milk I will move them to the stand and they will get as much as they want to eat on there.

Shayanna · #13 11/21/12, 11:45 AM

A little off topic for this thread, but:
Caliann, can I borrow your brain for a day? or atleast an hour? or a few minutes at that? The hubby has been wracking his, and he thinks he has an idea, but we aren't sure, and since you know ALOT more than I ever will about the science of it all, I figured you would have more information. What do you know about sulfur, and too much of it, in the ground water? He has read that too much can cause the goats to not "utilize"--for lack of a better word-- minerals as they should, which could cause deficiency, such as vitamin b1 deficiency (polio). I know we thought Fern had ketosis, but what if it really was polio. Yes we were giving b1/thiamine twice daily, but if its a water/sulfur problem, would it have done any good? do you know of a way to test?

and I finally convinced dh to do loose minerals.

CaliannG · #14 11/21/12, 12:15 PM

Too much sulfur in the groundwater and soil inhibits uptake of both the B-vitamins AND selenium. It will also inhibit the synthesizing of B-Vitamins by plants, and cause selenium to become unavailable to plants during growth.

HOWEVER injecting B-Vitamins and thiamine directly into the animal "bypasses" this circle. When it is injected, it is directly utilized BY the animal.

This is why thiamine is injected into animal that suffer from coccidiosis; since coccidia sucks thiamine out of the digestive tract and the goat's food, one of the major symptoms of the problem is thiamine deficiency. By injecting the thiamine, you insure that the goat gets it, rather than the parasites.

Your local extension office can test both your water and your soil for minerals, and can let you know what excesses and deficiencies you might have on your, particular, piece of property. That is actually more important than knowing your county averages.

Because *my* particular property is at the head of a now-dry stream, my property has a lot of "Williams Clay", which is poorer in nutrients and copper than my neighbor's "Luling Clay". There is less than 500ft between us, but our soil composition is very different.

Zilli · #15 11/21/12, 12:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sarah J

So I guess MY answer would be, why are you feeding the grain? Are these meat goats being finished for the butcher? Is the browse nutritionally deficient in a way that requires the extra? Or is it just that it is expected? I had a hard time convincing most of the people in my area that the grain wasn't necessary... It's the way they were told/ taught. It can also be much more convenient in some ways to feed grain.

Sooooo...more input into the how,why, breed and purpose of the goats?

I had a vet who was a firm believer that the only goats that needed grain are the "producers." And, to a small extent, the "working" bucks.

I have sixteen goats and only three of them get grain - my milker twice a day on the stand and the year and a half old doe that will get bred next month and my very old doe.

And what they get isn't straight "grain" but a mix of grain, alfalfa pellets, and shredded beet pulp. And the young doe and the old doe only get that once a day.

The main reason I even do it once a day for the young doe is so that I can give her a good once over once a day, watching for heat, and to get her in a semi routine of getting on the milk stand.

The reason I give my old doe the grain mix is because, well, she deserves it.

I have two stands, so while I'm milking, the young doe is on the second stand eating and the old doe is just fed in a dish on the ground.

As far as the OP's buck and whether or not he's "working," I suspect that if he is in with four does 24/7, then his work is done.

**mygoat** · #16 11/21/12, 12:33 PM

Well, I'm feeding grain to my bucks which, while in rut, worry so much about girls most of the time that they loose condition. My boer buck looks fabulous, my alpine looks skinny. Part dairy character, part his lack of eating, part his need to beat heads with the boer buck ALL THE TIME. Not a ton, and top dressed with Ammonium Chloride. They also get free choice hay.

I also should say that I do flush does starting a month pre-breeding. A SLIGHT increase in energy intake can trick them to let down more eggs and encourage twins-trips instead of singles-twins. Then a few weeks after breeding, decrease/eliminate grain from the diet, to encourage them to maintain the embryos.

Shayanna · #17 11/21/12, 12:37 PM

I'm going to be doing alot more research because it is like a lightbulb just went off. Hydrogen sulfide is more common in wetlands: riverbeds, creeks, swamps and marshes due to the higher amount of decaying organic matter. Which we have on the property(the wetlands). (The swamp is not included in the pasture, but maybe 50 yards outside of it.) My mother, who lives over by the swampy area, on the other side of the pasture, has a VERY noticable rotten egg smell to her water, which remains even after we changed the element in the water heater.
I am going to look into the testing thing. Maybe I am being paranoid, but so much of this seems to fit.....

Shayanna · #18 11/21/12, 12:40 PM

And thanks to all of your answers, Billy, Onyx and Paisley will all be going on a diet. Oh boy are they going to be ticked. lol. It shouldn't be too bad though, now that I will start doing free choice hay (the best we can.)