More Feed?

[ragdollcatlady]

My little girl is 39# and she is 4 1/2 months (April 5th). My little boy is 30# and he is 2 1/2 months (May 27th). They are both pure nigerian.

Truffles is only, just barely, not getting any more milk...finally! And Captain Jack Sparrow is still getting a bottle at night. I figured that since Truffles is coming along so nicely and she has been splurging on the milk for a long while, I'd indulge Jack (and of course myself since I enjoy it) and let him have a bottle for a bit longer. I suspect that since he doesn't have his mother, he would be healthier by getting the raw milk with all the natural probiotics etc..

I do give them grain. At the moment it is oats, BOSS and Calf Manna. I had weighed it out to keep around a 17 % ratio but I think that was a little too high for right now since we are in the 108 degree range so I cut it with a little more oats. I was using alfalfa pellets, but wanted to try a mix without it just for a change. I like the better mixability without the pellets since they are larger in size than the oats etc.

Truffles eats just about as much as she wants while the milking girls are milking. Jack gets some grain in the morning and evening (eats until he stops) to teach him to eat food when he is hungry (part of my weaning process). They all have alfalfa hay all the time.

Too much grain is a problem. But if your goat is accustomed to eating grain, more won't hurt. Consider that around here, some meat goat breeders/raisers don't want their goats to eat hay, only grain for fastest growth I guess. They feed them ALOT of grain, but since their systems are used to it, they are fine.

Your goats looks like they are in nice, shiny, condition. Suzie looks a little on the thin side to me only because I can see the "triangle" just in front of her hips that looks a little sunken in. My heavily milking girl is the only one of my nigerians that I can see that on and she came to me that way. If I were to put my hands over her spine I could feel a "handle".

I'll see if I can find my camera to show you...it is a little hard to explain...

 

[ragdollcatlady]

Sorry...I can't find the camera anywhere. I hope I didn't leave it at work!

I just looked up another weight I had written down for when I was worming everyone...May 13th, Abby was 12# and Truffles was 16# that would have been about 5 weeks old. These were the twins.

If anyone else with nigerians could throw out some weights and ages, that would be great....I would hate to be saying that Suzie looks a little thin to me if my goats are all just fat little piggies!

FOUND IT!!! It was at work OOPS!

OK...This is my thin girl. My son put his fingers in the "triangle " groove to emphasize it...the light in the garage is difficult to try and show this on the camera

this my fat kid, Truffles, She doesn't have any "handle" or "Triangle"

The scrape on her back is from her doing the jellyfish thing to squeeze through the 4x6 inch squares in the fence panels....she is huge but thinks she can still fit...kinda like me n skinny jeans

 

[Stacykins]

I definitely get what you mean with her looking thinner, especially visible in the hip area. Suzie and Dulce are the same height at the withers, so that 5lbs more Dulce has fills her out more. Suzie doesn't look badly thin, just a bit less than desired?

 

[20kidsonhill]

First off, I think they look really good.

secondly, to help give you an idea about amount of grain, at least the upper limit. When people feed out their meat wethers they are aiming for 3.5% to 4% of the wethers body weight in grain a day. So a 50 lb wether would be eating 2 lbs of grain a day, if they were getting 4% of their body weight a day in show grain. They rarely get any hay, or pasture.

I have found when weighing my feed and measuring the volumn, our pelleted goat feed is pretty close to 3 measuring cups per lb of feed. So a 50 lb kid being fed out for the fair could possibly be getting 6 cups of our pelleted feed a day. There will be a slight different in feeds when comparing volumn to weight, especiallly comparing a dry pelleted feed to a sweat feed ration.

I realize these aren't meat goats, but Hope that helps give you a different way of looking at the feed.

 

[ragdollcatlady]

Suzie doesn't look badly thin, just a bit less than desired?

Exactly...Your goats look like they have nice shiny coats, and look sturdy, bright and alert.

If they were mine...I would most likely increase Suzies feed some. I know that some of the other breeds of larger goats may tend to look thin when they have recently kidded or are in milk. Some babies (like Nubians) also look really lean. I have only had 7 baby goats raised here (6 nigerian and 1 nubian) and my nigerian babies don't have the "triangle" (that is just my term but when I see it, it makes sense).

I did have one that, in the wild, would have certainly not made it. She was so passive that when her mom literally kicked her off a teat, she would quit. Even when I held mom down. I ended up offering to let the babies nurse on my other does when I was milking if they were hungry still. They learned to come to me if they wanted some more milk. Their mom was a FF and not totally sold on the program. But I thought they were weaned around 5 weeks from mom (still nursing from my other does at milking time) only to see that just a few weeks ago I was still seeing fat little Truffles sneaking a nice long swig of the good stuff while out in the back pasture with mom! I guess she is coming around. Abby was smaller than Truffles but I don't recall seeing the triangle, so I think she was an OK weight. Just a little smaller.

You might find that if she eats more browse or hay, her hay belly will fill up some of that space. If you saw the posts with the thinness drawing/scale, that is a pretty good, descriptive guide...I could totally see where my thin girl would be at.

Hope this helps. I am not trying to be critical, your goats do really and truly look well fed and cared for.