Quality goat feed ensures quality meat or milk production. Providing adequate feed according to the demand of your goats help them to grow faster and produce more milk or meat.
Although goats always keep continue searching for foods. Usually, they can go far from their area for searching food. This type of food habit helps them to meet up the nutritional demands.
Naturally goats are very hardy and can tolerate weather change highly. They can survive for long time without water in heavy drought.
During natural disasters and food crisis, they can even consume low quality food. This type of survival with low quality food is not possible for other animals.
Their mouth are very strong among all the plant eating animals. With their strong mouth, they can eat any types of grasses, different types of leaves, branches of trees etc.
Goat convert food to quality meat or milk very fast than other animal. Although goat eat all types of food, but they do not like to eat same food always.
So, they should have diversity in their regular feeding habit. Goats usually do not eat leftovers of another goat. They can understand the taste of food, but they are not picky.
Even they can eat and consume such food which other animals don’t eat (even touch). But for commercial production, you must have to very very careful about goat feed. Always try to feed your goats quality food with proper nutrition and energy.
Classification Of Goat Feed
Like the food of other domestic animals, goat feed should contain proper amount of protein, fat, minerals and vitamins.
Goats usually drink less water than other livestock animals. Always try to provide them fresh and clean water. The types of goat feed are described below.
Roughage
Consuming this types of food is very difficult. This types of feed contain more than 18% fiber and less than 60% total digestible nutrient.
Roughage for goats are of two types. Dry roughage and succulent roughage. Succulent roughage contain 75-95% water. Grasses, maize, napier, jack fruit leaf, mango leaf, guava leaf, cabbage, vigna sinensis, pulse etc. are the source of roughage.
Goats have compound stomach. And they can take nutrition easily form roughage feed.
Grainy Feed
Grainy feed or feed mixer is easily digestible and enriched with various types of nutritious ingredients such as protein, carbohydrate and fat. This type of goat feed contain less water and less than 18% fiber.
Total digestible nutrient is less than 60%. The main sources of grainy goat feed are pulse, wheat, maize, rice, gram, pea, triticum aestivus, potato etc. Besides these, mustered cake, sesame cake, molasses, agricultural byproducts etc. are also good as grainy goat feed source.
Goat Feed Additives
For making balanced and nutritious goat feed, you need to mix different types of vitamins and minerals in the grainy feed. Along with this, you can get more vitamins and minerals from different types of vegetables.
By consuming roughage feed, your goats can only survive their life. But for producing meat, milk, skin or fur from goat commercially, you must have to feed them different types of grainy feed along with roughage/greens.
Mix different types of ingredients in the grainy goat feed. This will increase the taste of food and goat can easily digest it.
Essential Nutrition Ingredients In Goat Feed
Goats need different types of nutrient in their feed. A list about demand of essential nutrients ingredient of goats is shown below.
| Nutrition Ingredients | Demand |
| Dry Matterial | For meat production 2.5-3% of their body weight. For milk production 4-8% |
| Energy | A: 7-8 gram per kg body weight for survival. B: 3 gram per kg body weight for body growth. C: 300 gram for 1 litter milk production. |
| Protein | A: Every 10 kg goat needs 4.5-6.4 gram digestible crude protein for survival. B: 70 gram crude protein for 1 litter milk. |
| Water | Goat weights about 18-20 kg needs about 0.5-1.0 litter water daily. |
| Dry Food:Water | 1:4 |
| Minerals | 147 mg calcium and 72 mg phosphorus for per kg body weight of goat. |
Balanced Goat Feed
The food which contain all nutrient ingredients in proper ratio and quantity to meet up the demand of goat’s body is known as ‘balanced goat feed’.
Every goat needs quality nutritious food for healthy live and better production. If your goats do not get balanced feed, then they will not get nutritious ingredients according to their demand.
And it will reduce their production capability and damage their product’s quality. Follow the chart of nutritious goat feed.
| Feed Ingredients | Baby Goat (%) | Dairy Goat (%) | Meat Goat (%) | Pregnant Goat (%) |
| Gram | 20 | 15 | 20 | 50 |
| Maize/Broken Wheat | 22 | 37 | 23 | 20 |
| Sesame/Nut Cake | 35 | 25 | 30 | 20 |
| Wheat Powder | 20 | 20 | 24 | 7 |
| Minerals | 2.5 | 2.5 | 2.5 | 2.5 |
| Salt | 0.5 | 0.5 | 0.5 | 0.5 |
| Total | 100% | 100% | 100% | 100% |
In case of dairy goat farming, providing sufficient amount of greens and water play a vital role. Along with providing your goats nutritious food, ensure availability of sufficient amount of greens. And provide them adequate clean and fresh water according to their demand.
