A goat is an excellent option for a dairy animal for those who do not have the energy and time to have a cow. To get healthy goat milk in sufficient quantity, it is important to provide your pet with complete and high-quality food.
A goat's diet should include several types of feed. Roughage helps the animal in the digestion process. Their number should reach from 1 to 3 kg per day. It can be meadow and forest hay or branches (up to 1.5 kg per day). Brooms for feeding are cut in early summer using shoots of poplar, maple, birch, heather and other plants. Young branches of spruce and pine are suitable as a vitamin supplement.
Succulent feed plays a milk-producing role. In summer, goats nibble the grass, in winter they are given silage, potatoes and root crops - up to 4 kg per day in chopped form. Also suitable for feeding are carrot and beet tops, cabbage leaves, potato peels mixed with bran.
Concentrated feed is used in a volume of up to 1 kg per day. At the same time, grain and cake must be crushed, and the bran is soaked, otherwise they irritate the respiratory tract of animals. In addition, the goat's menu includes minerals: about 8 g of salt per individual per day and 20 g of crushed chalk for the queens and 10 g for the kids.
It is most convenient to organize three meals a day: at 6 am, around noon and no later than 7 pm. First, give concentrated feed, then put juicy, and "dessert" - rough. Food scraps and silage are usually served for breakfast.
