# How much feed?



## OSUman (Sep 27, 2010)

Hi, Im thinking about getting some goats to keep the grass down in my pasture since i  no longer have any cows and also to keep the predators away. I am wondering how much I need to feed goats a day if they have access to TONS of grass.   I know Ill need to feed more in the winter but I am just wondering how big of an investment it will be.


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## SDGsoap&dairy (Sep 28, 2010)

It will depend on a few factors like breed, age, open/gestating, dry/lactacting, quality of forage, time of year, etc.  I'm sure lots of seasoned folks can weigh in on this, but my dry/early gestation nigerian does are getting a maximum of 1/4 cup (dry measuring cup) of grain per day right now.  I have one that won't be getting any grain at all until late gestation.  On the flip side, our nubian needed around 10-12 dry measuring cups of concentrate (grain/alfalfa/BOSS mix) per day during early lactation and was still stripping some condition.

We don't have ours on pasture.  They get grass hay, alfalfa blend hay, and fairly limited time to browse on a couple acres of mixed deciduous woodland.


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## cmjust0 (Sep 28, 2010)

If you're strictly looking to keep pasture grass down, I'd probably go with sheep over goats.  Sheep are natural grazers, whereas goats are primarily browsers.  They'll trample down a good stand of fescue to get to a blackberry bush or a big stalk of ironweed.  Not a very efficient model if the goal is to have your grass kept down.

Goats don't do well on pasture, frankly.  They'll eat it, but since they're not really *designed* for it, they don't seem to have much natural resistance to the internal parasites which complete their lifecycles using grass.  The biggest nasty of that bunch is the barberpole worm and they're DEADLY to goats.  Controlling barberpoles is a huge, big, enormous, gigantic problem to people raising goats on pasture.


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## glenolam (Sep 28, 2010)

I'll also chime in and say that goats aren't very good predator deterrants, either.  They attract them more than scare them off.

Sheep or goats, you'll want to invest in a LGD or donkey/llama specifically bred for protection if one of your main goals is to scare off predators.


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## OSUman (Sep 28, 2010)

I would use the goats to knock down the grass which would intern deter the predetors that i have.  I was thinking about getting sheep but i noticed that you dont get alot return on sheep compared to gats and that was one of the reasons i was leaning towards goats.   I do have sheep at easy acess so i could just do that
Thanks


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## cmjust0 (Sep 28, 2010)

Problem is, it's impossible to know how much $$$ has gone into raising what few goats are making it to market in your area..  It's one thing to get $100 for a 60lb slaughter kid, but if you had to run $20 worth of meds through it to keep it alive...not to mention the time and aggravation...it really starts to cut into the bottom line!

Really, it sounds to me like sheep must work well in your area if lots of other people keep them.  I'd probably go that route if I were you.


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## OSUman (Sep 28, 2010)

cmjust0 said:
			
		

> Problem is, it's impossible to know how much $$$ has gone into raising what few goats are making it to market in your area..  It's one thing to get $100 for a 60lb slaughter kid, but if you had to run $20 worth of meds through it to keep it alive...not to mention the time and aggravation...it really starts to cut into the bottom line!
> 
> Really, it sounds to me like sheep must work well in your area if lots of other people keep them.  I'd probably go that route if I were you.


Ok cool, the reason I have easy acess to sheep because my 4-H leader raises them and is a high up in with clubs and such soo..

Thanks for all of the info


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## churchx3 (Sep 29, 2010)

I have a pygmy and a nigerian both girls approx 7 months old...I am currently feeding them hay, 1 1/2 cups of grain each per day, and they run the yard about 3-4 hours a day eating what they want...how badly am I overfeeding them?


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## glenolam (Sep 29, 2010)

It all depends on age/size and whether or not they are bred...


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## churchx3 (Sep 29, 2010)

glenolam said:
			
		

> It all depends on age/size and whether or not they are bred...


They are both approx 7 months old and no they are not bred.


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## glenolam (Sep 29, 2010)

Read this thread 

You can also search through the 'Feeding Time - Goats' to get more information.


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## cmjust0 (Sep 29, 2010)

churchx3 said:
			
		

> I have a pygmy and a nigerian both girls approx 7 months old...I am currently feeding them hay, 1 1/2 cups of grain each per day, and they run the yard about 3-4 hours a day eating what they want...how badly am I overfeeding them?


Basically, what you want to to is supplement their hay and forage with bagged feed according to their body condition.  Whether or not they're being under or over fed depends entirely on their body condition..

Are they fat?  And by fat, I mean, do they have large deposits of fat on them?  Check their 'armpit' areas, tailhead, brisket, etc.  If they're pretty jiggly or spongy in those areas, they're fat.  That would mean they're being overfed.

If there's no fat at all in those areas, their tailheads are sunken in, their spines are sticking up considerably, you can obviously see ribs, etc...they're too thin.  In that case, you'd either need to increase the quality of their ration (preferred) or up their bagged feed rations.

To me, perfect condition is a little bit of fat in the armpits, tailhead, brisket, etc., along with a nice SQ layer of fat over the ribs.  Not too much over the ribs, of course -- you still want to be able to _feel_ the ribs, but through a little padding.  If that's where their body conditions are, then you'd just keep on doing whatever you're doing because it's working.


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## ThornyRidge (Sep 29, 2010)

think it would definitely depend on type of goat you get.. most goats prefer  weeds, stemmy, briars and browse not "grazing grass" per se.  If you want to definitely keep grass in mowed down type I would go with sheep- there are different breeds of sheep to consider including hair sheep that might give better value


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