# Alternative Feed for Goats



## Onyx (Mar 27, 2015)

(Posted this on another forum as well but figured I'd post here also to get more feedback)

I am planning to keep a few dairy goats in the near future, so I'm reading up about all aspects of goat keeping as much as I can.

I'm wondering, however, if anyone has thoughts about replacing the goat pellets/grain with other foods.

I plan to start out with the usual hay, pelleted feed and loose minerals, but...

Eventually I'd like to grow as much of my own feedstuffs as possible, and I can't grow fields of grain... and it seems to me that there are other kinds of foods like sweet potatoes and things like lentils and other beans that could potentially meet nutritional needs, and that are easier for me to produce myself.

I will still be using hay and mineral supplement since I can't produce those myself, but would at least cut back on what I need to get from other sources...

Also, how did/do people who don't have access to a handy feed store keep their goats alive and productive? Most of the world doesn't have access to things like loose minerals in bags or pelleted rations. 

I see a lot of people (in general) touting self-sufficiency but it doesn't seem particularly self-sufficient to me to rely so heavily on things that require ordering from the internet or physically going to a store to pick them up ^^;


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## Pearce Pastures (Mar 27, 2015)

When just keeping a few goats and with having limitation on land, very few anywhere at all in a civilized nation are completely off the grid and still raising livestock in any capacity.  Self-sufficiency definitely comes in degrees.  We are able and have the know how to handle birds, goats, rabbits and other animals, keep them healthy, breed them, and process them for eating.  We can grow and preserve our own food.  But with that of course comes some interdependence on others, including feed businesses.

Can one raise goats without supplementation, without passing along a dollar to another person for their goods?  Sure.  Especially in rural, and less modernized regions of the world.  But they have higher losses.  Their goats are very hardy, and lots of nice goat breeds have come out of just that situation, where they have not had medication, minerals, medical care, easy feeding and as a result are very resilient (like the Kiko for example).  That hardiness comes at a price too though in the form of higher losses.  If a goat needs medical care, has inadequate mineral intake/absorption, and what not, they will either survive because they are a hardier/more naturally healthy animal or will not produce well and may die earlier.  

If one had oodles of space for their goats to range, with lots of woody vegetation, and have a plan for protection against predators, and had a thorough handle on how to manage medical care for goats, they might get away from buying minerals, feeds, and other items that make keeping domesticated animals easier for most.  

We are now able to give our goats access to pasture and woody ares for much of the year and using hotwire, can change the location on which they browse.  But of course, that still requires things that WERE store bought and during cold months, we do have to still purchase hay and feed because they can't get all that they need from what we have and still be healthy.   I personally don't have such high numbers or have tons and tons of acreage for my goats to utilize that losses wouldn't matter much.


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## Onyx (Mar 27, 2015)

It's not necessarily that I want to go off-grid completely.  But I get more and more disturbed at how disconnected we are from being able to care for ourselves and our animals without recourse to constant trips to the store.

I can't think of a time when people expected to produce EVERYTHING they needed at home - barter or purchase is generally always a fact of human life.

But I feel that I should at least know how to take care of the basic necessities like being able to have livestock that won't die from being able to be fed a commercial pellet or mineral supplement.  There must be things that can be grown or minerals from the earth that would be able to adequately supply an animal - though I am certain that it would affect milk production.  However, since I'm only looking for enough milk for personal use for milk and cheese for two people, I really don't need my goats to be producing gallons of milk every day, anyways.

I kind of feel that it's a problem if our livestock have become so weak that they can't survive without this degree of commercial feed intervention.


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## Pearce Pastures (Mar 27, 2015)

Self-reliance is fantastic. I guess then your question is what do you need to raise your goats and keep them healthy without any store purchases.

1) Lots of land with lots or woody browse and trees for goats to consume.  More than just a couple of acres because the nutritional needs of the animals will not be met and the quality of the forage will be reduced over time.

--Or--

Time and land to grow, harvest, dry, and store your feeds. 

2) A homemade fence, movable--or a way to contain and protect the animals but still allowing them to browse as they need.

3) A buck to keep freshening the doe once a year

4) A depth of knowledge on how to manage parasites and injuries using what is available


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## babsbag (Mar 27, 2015)

I would love to be able to feed my herd off of the land, but I can't. It is amazing how fast 20 goats can clear 5 acres of grass, brush, and trees. We can't grow alfalfa as we are not on level land and we have no summer rains and no means to do large scale irrigation. My goats live on alfalfa, they only get grain on the milk stand. They do get minerals.

Yes there is food you can grow for them and let them graze it, but you have to be careful letting them into any field of a new food they like for an extended time, bloat is sure to follow. If you have a way to harvest feed and store it that would help, I don't. So I feed "snacks" like pumpkins, squash, green beans, peas, etc. but none of it replaces the alfalfa. The long stemmed fiber is a must with goats, and the high protein is even more important with dairy goats.


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## Onyx (Mar 28, 2015)

@babsbag I was more thinking of replacing the other things in the diet than hay   I consider alfalfa to be a hay product, because while I know it's a legume, here it's general found in the form of "alfalfa hay" rather than by itself.


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## alsea1 (Mar 29, 2015)

If you want your goats to produce enough milk for cheese you will need to feed them well. It takes a lot of groceries for a goat to produce that much milk.
Properly balanced minerals are critical for milk production. If the needs are not met the goat will go downhill and you will be trying to get them healthy again.
Goats are eating machines.  Even just a couple goats can clear a pretty big area in a years time.


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## Onyx (Mar 29, 2015)

@alsea1 Of course I certainly don't want my goats to lack for nutrition or to make them unhealthy.  Simply looking for a more home-based way to meet their nutritional needs


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## SheepGirl (Mar 29, 2015)

Your animals won't die from not eating pellets or minerals... they will get sick and probably die from a lack of nutrition because they aren't being given adequate substitutes for pellets or minerals.

If you are looking to replace pellets, you will need to find an alternative feedstuff that is at least 12-14% protein on a dry matter basis. Small scale, you will still probably find a hard time trying to grow enough sweet potatoes and beans to feed your animals to meet their needs.

Sweet potatoes are 76% moisture and only 8% protein (on a DM basis, 2% on an as-fed basis). They aren't a very good feed source.

Have you considered buying grain directly from another farmer? That will cut down dependence on a feed store (even if the same said farmer sells to the feed store), and you will be giving the money directly to a farmer and you can work on a mutually beneficial relationship (you get feed for your goats, they get money to continue farming).

Part of being sustainable is using resources efficiently. When you have to feed a couple pounds of sweet potatoes to equate the same nutrition of 1 lb of corn, that's not very efficient.


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## Onyx (Mar 29, 2015)

I'm really not keen on feeding grain to ruminants, tbh.  The book I'm reading right now talks briefly about some people successfully switching goats to purely grass/forage based nutrition and cutting out the grain and mentions alfalfa pellets in the same section, but isn't very clear or detailed, so I may need to do more investigation there.  Honestly if 2 pounds of sweet potato would do the job, it would be much more efficient for me because I am already planning to grow a lot of sweet potatoes and not corn.  I'm not sure that sweet potato would be a good replacement though, I mean I don't particularly want to feed grain because it's not really a natural food for ruminants and can cause acidosis and other problems... but root vegetables are not a natural food either as far as I know 

Same book also touched on the fact that mineral supplementation is necessary due to the fact that goats are not native here, with the added complication that goats are usually drinking well water, which is drawn from far underground instead of being groundwater, which affects the mineral content.  Very interesting.


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## SheepGirl (Mar 29, 2015)

Did you know that corn is a grass plant? The seeds are the grain. My sheep routinely eat the seed heads off of the timothy, orchard, and fescue grass that grows in their pasture. Ruminants are designed to digest rough plant products. That includes grain. I'm not sure where this whole thing came about, where ruminants aren't designed to eat grain. They have a mouth and a ruminant digestive system capable of extracting nutrients from grain. Acidiosis is usually caused by a large increase in carbohydrates (energy) at one feeding -- grain is usually high in energy, hence why it is the primary cause of acidiosis.

http://www.merckmanuals.com/vet/dig...nt_forestomach/subacute_ruminal_acidosis.html
http://www.merckmanuals.com/vet/dig..._forestomach/grain_overload_in_ruminants.html

Ruminants also get grass tetany, but that's no reason for them to not eat grass. 

However, you can feed alfalfa pellets to help make up some of the nutrition.

For example, a doe in late gestation with twins needs the following:
2.8 lb TDN
0.47 lb CP

Let's just say your average grass hay is 56% TDN and 7% CP.
Alfalfa pellets are 50% TDN and 16% CP.

Let's just start and say you will feed 4 lbs of grass hay. That will give you 2.24 lbs of TDN and 0.28 lbs CP. That makes your ration DEFICIENT 0.56 lb TDN and 0.19 lb CP. To fix this you can add 1.2 lbs of alfalfa pellets. That will give you 0.6 lb TDN and 0.192 lb CP, which will put you up above the deficient level.

This was a really simplified example showing just energy (TDN) and protein (CP). You will also need to balance your rations for Ca, P, and dry matter. You can balance it for other minerals and vitamins, but those are usually taken care of with a loose mineral.

Nutrition is a bit more complicated than taking out traditional feedstuffs and substituting them with nontraditional feedstuffs -- you have to balance rations to make sure the nutrients are properly balanced for the health of your goat.


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## Onyx (Mar 29, 2015)

Sure, ruminants will eat seed heads on grass, but when foraging they are not getting a big dose of seed (grain) all at one time, they way they do when they are fed a pound of grain, which is the way grain is usually fed.

No, it's definitely not a simple subject, which is why I'm looking for information   I had hoped that perhaps other people may have some first-hand experience with different feeding regimens.

The book I'm reading did mention that the alfalfa pellets have a "perfect ratio of calcium".  (It's called Raising Goats Naturally, by Deborah Niemann).


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