Feeding goat kids from the first days of life: what to feed goats

Goats of all varieties are bred for one thing – it’s milk. Unlike other cattle, they have several times more useful and more expensive. But, in order to grow a good dairy goat, you need to spend enough time on the care and maintenance of the goats.

Initially need to know what to feed them. It is from a proper diet will depend on the future of the goat milk yield and the duration of its life.

Feeding goat kids from the first days of life

Experts in the field of goat breeding, there are two ways which are fed to young sheep. The first is the goat from the first days of life. The mother from the first days of life. Choosing the right method, then we choose the option to feed the kids. In that case, if mom gives a lot of milk, it is separated from the babies and keep separately. An adult goat young can only be the case if the goat does not give enough yield.

The first time the food an hour and a half, and in some cases, an hour after their birth. In order to protect an adult animal from stress, and also to protect from disease can only help milk production.

The first jet released as colostrum utilized. Farmers believe that they are harmful and unsuitable for use. Watered the only kid from the bowl. The bowls of adult animals harvested to have the kids not had access to them. The essence of this method lies in the fact to protect an adult animal from stress. If the mother removed the young and put it separately, it does not have to see them. Such manifestations of turbulence can affect the quantity of milk produced.

But it is worth notingthat not every baby wants to drink from the bowl. As a rule, dip it in there face and teach with your finger. But in this case must be sterile and clean.

Feeding kids without a mother

Another system by which koryu kids from the first days of life is feeding without a mother. It will turn on colostrum – the first milk of the mother. Farmers believe that it will help cleanse the body of mucus, as well as to establish the gastro-intestinal tract.

Colostrum contains beneficial minerals that help to strengthen the body kids. Colostrum-fed goats according to statistics, less susceptible to various diseases. In no case do not give colostrum to the kids, if the more goat mastitis. If there is a goat disease milk are utilized, it is harmful.

In the first month of life kids are fed five times a day, every few hours. This option allows you to leave the babies with mom. But at the same time. this system negative effect on the milk yield of the mother. If the farmers decide that the kids need to leave with the mother, then to excommunicate them from it not earlier than in four months. Gradually in the diet of toddlers introduce chalk and salt. The optimal period for the additional forage is considered to be the twentieth day since the birth of the baby. To achieve the kids at two months of age they are given a few grams of mineral additives.

Features feeding kids

Kids are not allowed to release with older individuals to reach them one month of birth. Kids can get extra food is grass. In that case, if the kid is small and weak, they give to the basic portions of an additional glass of milk. But this dosage is calculated individually, depending on age and weight.

Stop feeding the calves milk since the age of three. This period is long and can reach a two-week course. Thus, there remains the health of the animal, while not forgetting the milk yield. Depending on the age of goat is calculated as frequency of feeding. Breakfast for kids is served at five in the morningand dinner at eight o’clock in the evening. In winter, the morning meal is served at six o’clock.

The first week after birth the young serving milk only at room temperature. The fifteenth day they trough give no more than five grams of hay or chalk. The additional forage necessary for the growth and development kids and learning the habit of eating regular food. Youngsters aged seven months in the winter season fed with hay (not more than two kilogram). And add feed (no more than 200 grams, depending on weight of kid). In the diet of young animals should be succulent feed, with vitamins and minerals. Are allowed to gradually enter into the diet of root cropssuch as potatoes or beet.

For kids, who are fed without the mother can the first days of life to enter the oatmeal. Grits are cooked just before feeding and slightly podsalivaya. Porridge will provide goats the optimum temperature. Before feeding to young animals, it is filtered. Vegetables can be served fresh, but cut before serving.

As for feed, you can cook by yourself. It can be made from bran, oats, chalk or bone meal. If you feed a kid properly, by six-month age they will increase their weight by six pounds. Weight should always control the farmer, regularly weighing of the goats.

Allowed from an early age to produce kids for a walk. Fresh air youngsters need. It is beneficial to their health. Pleasure time for kids valid at the age of three weeks up to five hours. In a month you can release them together with older goats for the day to graze.

Feeding the kid with the first day of life the natural way is always better than other options. Compare the two kid, you will find that breastfed youngsters looks beautiful, grows faster and does not hurt. But in some cases, there is no way to keep mother and baby together.

It is prohibited to keep a goat and kid for a long time. Goats can dissolve the outside of the nipple that leads to swelling. And also to separate the kids from the goats will be harder. On the growth and development of this indicator is not affected, only on milk yield.

During weaning the kids from the mother they wear a muzzle. In that case, if he climbs to her mother, she runs away. Temporary measures are required to goats forgot mom and more did not approach her. To feed them and be without a mom.

Without the mother feed the babies, if a goat is a breed of Holsteins high-milk. The young are immediately taken away and they are bottle-fed. Some farmers feed young out of the bowl, the other feed from a bottle with a nipple.

Feeding goat kids from the first days of life without my mom: features

In that case, if goats consume food poorly or too quickly, can be formed of casein clumps in the stomach and intestines. They can disappear badly, they can rot or ferment. In this embodiment, the body kids can respond to intoxication.

Fed should be weaned from the mother goats milk, which is heated to a temperature pair. Obligatory condition of feeding is the feeding of the colostrum. For newborns, colostrum is the only source of startup of the immune system.

Without a mother goat kids fed during the day every four hours. Further, young animals are fed morning and evening. Every day they are given porridge as a source of useful vitamins and minerals. On the tenth day of life give the goats hay and given water in that quantity which they want. After that, the kids gradually be given different foods, gradually accustoming to each type of feed. Until the portion reaches certain rules, goats feed. As children goats need constant monitoring reaction to the new type of feed. Milk cease to give gradually in small portions.

At the age of one month kids let out with adults. Goats who feeds the mother while walking can arbitrarily vskarmlivanie. Young, who was excommunicated from the mother in the first days of life remembers his mother and is not suitable for her.

If you properly nurture kids, they grow full and healthy.

Feeding pasteurized milk

Another option or alternative may be feeding pasteurized milk. This product has a natural origin and is not inferior to natural feeding. Pasteurization of milk is needed in order to kill it all falls during the small malicious organisms.

Pasteurized milk quickly and slowly.

Let’s consider both ways.

  1. A quick method of pasteurization is the heating the main ingredient to a temperature of seventy-four degrees plus. The total heating time is half a minute.
  2. The slow way, temperature of milk is lowered by ten degrees. On the fire the milk is kept for half an hour.

For the preparation of pasteurized milk in household farms used any household stove with a thermometer. Also, can be used household pasteurizer. It is required for those farms where a lot of young is on artificial feeding. After milk is pasteurized it is cooled in a glass container. In order to avoid a complete sterilization of glassware is also pasteurized.

Colostrum for the kid also heated, but in another way. For this purpose it is kept on the stove for hours. The temperature required for heating shall be not less than fifty-six degrees Celsius. This process allows you to kill all disease-causing organisms. The most important are antibodies that are necessary for the growth and development of young animals to keep in an active state.

Feed kids without a mother using a bottle, bowl or drinking troughs. The water of the young must always be present and only clean. The growth of goats, over time, will be therefore the duration of feeding of goats will increase as they grow.

Feeding kids under the uterus

Feeding kids under the uterus – is a convenient, optimal and natural way. Applies only for goat with low milk productivity. Calves suckle until the age of three and suck the udder, which is before him always in the public domain.

During natural-feeding farmers provide care for your Breasts. The isolation, especially in the first days of life, babies accumulate on the nipple of the goat. They need to be removed and to ensure that they have not led to the development of dangerous diseases, mastitis. Before feeding and after feeding, always check the udder for the presence of such secretions.

After the kids grow up to three weeks of age, they still continue to feed under the uterus. But the number of them consumed milk is reduced several times. Farmers at this time carefully enter a feed, which gradually increased. From the time when the goats go out to graze in the pasture, begin to wean from the goats and give the mixture of bran, oats and sunflower. The milk is replaced with oatmeal, with a mixture of bran, chowder, wheat flour. In addition, the diet includes grass, tree bark and more.

Like any other method, feeding under the uterus has a number of advantages and disadvantages. Having considered them, you will be able to understand exactly how best to proceed and what to feed kids.

The advantages of the method under the uterus should include.

  1. Milk and colostrum as the main food enter the body of the young. The cubs get more nutrients and essential vitamins growth and development.
  2. A strong immune system. Unlike babies who are bottle-fed they are less susceptible to diseases, including infectious nature.
  3. Growth, weight and sexual maturation occurs faster at natural feeding.
  4. The young learn faster to switch to natural food, hay or grass.
  5. Simplicity and minimum cost the farmers both financially and time.

Despite the five points of benefits, still the natural method of feeding has its own special disadvantages, to consider when choosing food for young.

  1. Those goats that were born in autumn or summer, when the pasture in the paddock completely suck a goat. As a result, it does not give the right amount of milk, and in rare cases, susceptible to mastitis.
  2. Constant exhaustion goats leads to the fact that her nipples become unemployed. That’s a concern moms and swelling.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *