This is the second piece in a series on raising goats. You can find the first, my thoughts on breeding age and some observations on behaviour here. Again, I can only write from my own experience and situation—every farm, climate, land and system will have different needs and different ways of doing things. Take what you want from what I offer, do your own research, gather your own experience, learn from your goats, make your own decisions for your herd and farm.
I lean on my own observations. My goats are my greatest teachers. I’m not here to quote numbers, weights or feed percentages, you can easily find that kind of info online. I don’t weigh feed, there are so many variables that will affect how much my goats will eat on any day—the quality of their forage, their activity level, the weather, the stage they’re at in their pregnancy, lactation, and so on. That said, some basic calculations can be helpful in determining quantities when I’m buying in bulk feed, how many bales will see us through the winter and so on, but then I let that go and judge by eye on condition and appetite as we go through. I learned when first studying equine and then human nutrition that you can make it as complicated or as simple as you want. I prefer to keep it simple. I approach feeding my goats with the same principles as I feed myself and my whole rabbit, raw tripe and butcher trim fed dogs: “just eat real food”, species appropriate, and as natural, unadulterated, seasonal, and place based as possible within the context of a domestic setting. On that note, I never feed compound feeds, not anymore (I did when we were starting out and I didn’t know how to do better, and I wasn’t happy with the condition of my animals so I learned to do better), and rarely feed grain (my homebred and forage adapted nannies and kids never get grain). I look to how animals live and feed themselves in their wild or feral setting, and I have spent a lot of time watching my goats, observing them browsing freely over the hill, chomping brown heather and green gorse, foraging along the hedgerows for bramble leaves, blackberries, honeysuckle, ferns and celandines, and picking through their meadow hay for the plantains and docks that they always relish first.
Good observation is the foundation for good animal husbandry. As simple as taking the time to quietly sit with them and watch, giving them choices and noting what they choose, observing how their preferences evolve through the seasons and their life stage, and the life stage of the plants they eat. I know my goats love willow bark in winter, after the leaves have fallen, while in spring they prefer the fresh shoots, chowing down twigs and all. I know they prefer the winter heather in its old, woody state, munching the browning tops long after it has flowered and set seed, ignoring the fresh green growth beneath, and the gorse after it’s been softened by the frost. Through summer and autumn, kids go nuts for bramble leaves while the grown-ups reach higher for hazel, ivy and willow. Thistle tops are deftly munched just as their purple blooms burst open to the high summer sun. Growing kids and does in milk will look for the lushest, sweetest grass while the dry does are content with hay and woody browse. Given choices, they choose what they need when they need it. Feeding from the land they live on, their senses synchronise to the seasons and the land provides what they need when they need it—as far as the limits of the land allow. My job then, is to make up the deficits when the land can’t provide to keep my animals in tiptop shape and feeding us while working in balance with the land.
I will assume that anyone reading this will have at least a basic grasp of the workings of ruminant digestion. But just in case anyone needs a recap, I give you this brief summary from the USDA Goat Extension (the whole article is a succinct description of the ruminant digestive system that you can read here):
“Goats are ruminants, animals with a four-compartment stomach, as are cattle, sheep and deer. The compartments are the reticulum, rumen, omasum and abomasum, or true stomach. Monogastric or simple-stomached animals such as humans, dogs and cats consume food that undergoes acidic breakdown in the stomach and enzymatic digestion in the small intestine, where most nutrients are absorbed. In ruminants, feed first undergoes microbial digestion in the reticulum and rumen — together, often called the reticulo-rumen — prior to acidic digestion in the abomasum and enzymatic digestion and nutrient absorption in the small intestine. The microbial digestion in the reticulo-rumen allows ruminants to consume and utilize grass, hay, leaves and browse.
The reticulum and rumen form a large fermentation vat that contains microorganisms, mainly bacteria, that breakdown and digest feedstuffs, including the fibrous component of grass, forbs, and browse that cannot be digested by monogastric animals.”[1]
Grazing and browsing herbivores can’t actually digest all that fibrous forage they eat themselves—but the bugs in their digestive systems do it for them, breaking down fibre and transmuting it into proteins, fatty acids and vitamins for digestion and absorption further along the digestive tract (in equines and gorillas, microbial fibre fermentation happens later, in a specialised, enlarged caecum after acid digestion in the stomach; microbial fermentation in the rumen before acid digestion makes more nutrients—in particular protein—available for absorption and thus ruminants the more efficient fibre feeders). It may look like our goats grow strong and healthy on a salad bar diet, but the stuff the goat actually digests is very high fat and protein—the products of microbial fibre fermentation. Put simplistically: the goat feeds the bugs, the bugs eat the plants, then the goat eats the bugs.
Ruminants get most of their energy from the fatty acids produced by microbial fermentation[2], and their protein needs met by the high turnover of bacteria in their rumens that feed on the forage and are digested along with the rest of the products of fermentation[3]. So except in very high production systems and as long as those gut bugs are kept happy and healthy with plenty of high quality forage, they should normally be able to get all of their protein and energy requirements from forage alone (pasture, hay, browse, and forage feeds like beets or turnips), just as they evolved to do—feeding the microbial flora of their internal landscape that in turn feed them while giving manure inoculated with microbial life back to the soil as they go. Symbiosis in action, spiralling inward and outward, the ruminant as a conduit for life.
The takeaway message is this: look after the bugs (in the soil and in the rumen), and the bugs will look after the goat.
And if there’s one thing I’ve learned in all my years of feeding fibre munchers (horses and ruminants), the quality and quantity of the fibre that feeds their gut bugs is of the utmost importance. No amount of supplements or grain feeding will make up for crappy or inadequate forage, or keep the natural, glowing condition on an animal that comes from good forage feeding. That is not to say there’s never a time for supplements or concentrates, but in my humble opinion they should be used judiciously and only when absolutely needed to supplement a diet based on the best forage available. My nannies and kids get alfalfa pellets and beet when they’re in production or growth and need a bit more than their diet of mountain scrub, purple moor grass and meadow hay can give, while we’re working on improving our grass pastures, plus seaweed, salt, and minerals. (I’ll talk more about minerals and supplements another time).
Goats, as ruminants go, particularly dairy goats, have a relatively large rumen capacity, designed to consume large amounts of tough, woody fibre. This makes goats especially efficient fibre fermenters and well suited to 100% pasture/forage systems. It also means goats spend less time feeding (they’re able to pack a huge amount of forage in in a short space of time) and more time loafing around contemplating the great mysteries of life, developing their highly complex social order and figuring out puzzles like how to untie the gate while they digest it all. I make sure my goats always have free access to their shelter or yard, or a loafing area of rock or hardstanding on their paddock where they can hang out in between foraging expeditions—otherwise they’ll stand around at the gate for most of the day waiting to come in and sussing out the best spot to jump the fence.
What it means in terms of pasture feeding is that goats do best on older growth that’s been allowed to grow long and fibrous, and on scrub and woody browse. Browsers, not grazers. Goats don’t just prefer woody browse; they have a physiological requirement for it. It means pasture stocking rates need to be kept low to allow long growth periods. If all that’s available is fresh, young pasture, goats will appreciate some coarse hay or straw—they need the extra roughage—and plenty of tree or hedge forage for the variety, minerals, tannins and other phytonutrients they need that even the most diverse grass pasture won’t supply. If they’re standing around chewing fenceposts or stripping their timber stalls, they probably need more fibre or tree browse. Being browsers, not grazers, goats also don’t have a lot of natural resistance and are very susceptible to internal parasites picked up from grazing short grass (plenty of high tannin tree browse will also help keep worm counts down). The keys to keeping healthy, pastured goats are diversity (lots of weeds and woody browse), and keeping their pasture above knee height, at the very least. (I’m assuming closed pastures—if goats are out on range or mountain where they have freedom to roam and a multitude of short and long grasses and plants to choose, that second point won’t be an issue). And of course, pasture should also reflect the production stage of the animal—dry goats will only need the roughest forage, while goats in milk and young, growing kids will want the best, freshest pasture they can get. Sync with the seasons, and the seasons provide.
Feeding and pasturing are huge topics, worthy of lifetime learning and books unto themselves (I’ve included some recommended reading below). I have barely skimmed the surface here. As I’m writing, I’m seeing avenues for discussion in future posts opening up: pasture herbs and browse versus toxic weeds (I don’t generally worry about them—when my goats have choices, they choose wisely); forage feeding for milk and growth; transitioning from grain fed to forage fed (it can be done); soil, minerals and supplements; how the land responds to the livestock in a dynamic dance of reciprocation, the goat as a driver of regeneration, co-creator of her landscape.
1 Goats. (2019, August 14). Goat Nutrition GI tract – Goats. https://goats.extension.org/goat-nutrition-gi-tract/
2 Bergman, E. N. (1990). Energy contributions of volatile fatty acids from the gastrointestinal tract in various species. Physiological Reviews, 70(2), 567–590. https://doi.org/10.1152/physrev.1990.70.2.567
3 Khan, M. M. H. (2016). Dynamics of microbial protein synthesis in the rumen -A Review. Sylhetagrivarsity. https://www.academia.edu/26503684/Dynamics_of_microbial_protein_synthesis_in_the_rumen_A_Review?auto=download
4 Rumen microorganisms as providers of high quality protein. (n.d.). https://www.lrrd.cipav.org.co/lrrd6/3/1.htm
The Art and Science of Grazing by Sarah Flack is an excellent place to start on pasture management.
Holistic Goat Care by Gianaclis Caldwell has a good section on goat nutrition and feeding.
Goat Guts!
I hypothesize that the tree roughage helps keep parasites at bay in two ways: Firstly, tannin is an acid, which is used by plants themselves to keep insects etc at bay, and it may be adjusting the pH of the microbial digestion in order to be inhospitable to parasites. The older a plant is the more tannin it has collected over in its body. Secondly, cell walls are sharp. Tiny bacteria will have little trouble dodging around the sharp cell walls of older woody plants in a liquid filled sac. It's easy to move in all directions when you can swim. A larger parasite will quickly be lacerated by such sharp edges and succumb to it's wounds as it is jostled and squished against woody plants.
Mostly conjecture, but I believe that I am close to the mark.