dairy goats management

Feeding, housing and general management is still a big problem among dairy goat owners.

A bad example of a dairy goat shed where does and bucks are kept together

Poor management of dairy goats is one of the main problems facing the dairy goat sub-sector in Kenya. Although farmers spend a lot of money buying dairy goats, it is a pity when one visits their homesteads and sees the condition of the goats, including the goat sheds. Selective breeding is important, but farmers should know that breeding alone cannot give a good quality dairy goat.

To explain it in an easier way: Breeding accounts for only 33 per cent of a goat’s productiveness. Nutrition and management accounts for 66 per cent, while a farmer’s entrepreneurship accounts for only 10 per cent. This clearly shows that proper feeding and general care of a dairy goat are the most important areas in dairy goat production. That is why it is important that farmers know how to feed a goat and the best way to house it.

Feeding a dairy goat

To produce adequate milk, a dairy goat requires a well-balanced diet for both self-maintenance and production of milk. A dairy goat is very selective in what it eats. To encourage it to eat, farmers need to provide it with very high quality fodder. If the fodder is of low quality, the goat will refuse to eat it leading to wastage. A female goat that is being milked requires at least 1.25 kg of good quality dried grass or Lucerne in a day.

Need for balanced diet

Goats tend to eat more if they are zero-grazed than when on free range. The farmer should chop the green fodder such as Napier grass to make it easier for the goat to chew; this reduces wastage. If more than one type of forage is available, goats tend to eat more. The fodder may include potato vines, maize stalks, sorghum or waste vegetables. Legumes such as Lucerne, green beans, purple vetch, acacia, leucaena, cotton seed cake, sunflower cake, and soybean cake are a good source of proteins. Salt licks are needed to provide minerals.

Proper feeding increases a dairy goat's milk production and improves its health

It is important to know how a dairy goat’s digestion works. The main difference between a goat and a cow or a sheep is that the goat has a much bigger stomach in comparison to its body size compared to the other two animals. The stomach of the goat can be as much as 1/3 of the total body volume. This makes the goat a very efficient converter of rough feeds or browse, but the process uses up a lot of energy and there is also a need for minerals especially phosphorous. One reason goats prefer browse bushes and trees is that these plants are deep -rooted and bring up many more essential minerals from deep inside the soil that the goat needs.

A large proportion of the feed it eats is converted into milk. A goat can convert more dry roughage into milk compared to a dairy cow, but the forage must be clean and dry all the time. The amount of feed a goat eats depends on its body size and also on the quality of the feed. From the different types of feed given, a farmer can tell which type of feed it likes most. Remove waste feed at least twice a day. If there is a lot of waste, this should tell you the goat is either being given too much feed than it can eat or it does not like type of feed. A 45 kg goat that is being milked should be consuming up to 7 per cent of her body weight (about 3.4 kg) of dry matter and can drink 4 to 5 litres of clean water daily.

Give concentrates

As in the case of dairy cows, the roughage part of the ration is rarely good enough to provide maintenance for the animal, let alone milk production. It is important to add the concentrate to the ration. Avoid giving barley as it can cause bloat or poisoning if fed in large quantities.

The more the amount of milk a goat produces, the more the amount of concentrate it should be given (table below). A small quantity of concentrate should be fed even when the goat is not being milked in order to help it in body maintenance and also in the development of her unborn kid when pregnant. A goat will normally go though a daily process of eat-rest-ruminate-eat-rest-ruminate and so on.

Hygiene and housing of dairy goats

Maintaining hygiene and keeping goats in proper housing is still a big problem with most dairy goat farmers. Unlike other domestic animals, a dairy goat prefers to live in a dry and clean place. A simple way to do this is to build a house with a raised floor. A floor made of timber pieces with spaces between (slatted floor) allows the urine and droppings to pass through the spaces and leaves the floor clean and dry. The water and feeding trough should be placed outside the house (sketch). Goats should be protected from windy conditions especially during the cold season when they easily contract pneumonia.

Most farmers keep their goats indoors throughout the day. Most of the time, the goats can hardly move due to the small size of the house. All animals should be allowed to go out into open space where they can graze, exercise and get adequate light. Organic farming standards stipulate that all animals should be allowed free movement to reduce stress and allow them to express normal behaviour.

Despite the increasing demand for dairy goats due to diminishing land sizes in Kenya, production is growing very slowly due to poor breeding and management practices by small-scale farmers. The problem has been worsened by lack of an umbrella body that could regulate production, train farmers and set standards for improving the quality of dairy goats. Many farmers and brokers have taken advantage of this to sell low quality dairy goats claiming they are pure breeds.

Farmers lack breeding skills

A meeting of dairy goat stakeholders held in Nakuru in November last year found that the dairy goat sub-sector cannot grow unless urgent measures are taken to reduce inbreeding and poor management. Donor funding for dairy goat projects takes between 3 to 5 years despite the fact that any successful breeding programme should take no less than 10 to 15 years.

According to statistics, out of the 100,000 dairy goats in the country, only 12,000 are registered with the Kenya Stud Book (KSB). Most of the farmers who own dairy goats lack the most basic skills in dairy goat management. The privatization of veterinary services and the government’s preoccupation with dairy cattle has worsened the problem.

The average milk production of dairy goats is 2.5 litres in the country although dairy goats produce between 4 and 8 litres, if well managed.

Although AI services have been introduced in the country, very few dairy goat farmers benefit from the service due to lack of trained personnel to do it. In this issue we educate farmers on the basic requirements on dairy goat breeding. In one of our future issues we will educate you about feeding and general management of dairy goats.

How to improve quality through controlled breeding

Dairy goat breeding is a technical area that farmers need to understand before they can start upgrading their stock:

1. It is important for the farmer to know the reason why they want to upgrade their goats. The main reason why farmers go into breeding is to try and improve their animals to acquire certain characteristics or reduce other characteristics that they do not want.

2. Farmers may decide to upgrade their goats to reduce certain characteristics that they do not want e.g. the goats may be producing less milk because they have small udders. Other goats have small legs that make it difficult for the animal to walk properly or even stand when feeding. One of the main aims of breeding is to bring up animals that can survive changes in the environment and which are well adapted to the local climatic conditions.

There are three main breeding programmes that farmers can choose:

1. Pedigree Breeding

In pedigree breeding, a farmer buys already registered animals whose pedigree is known. To continue the pedigree line, the farmer has to serve the pedigree doe (female goat) with a pedigree buck (male goat) of a desired characteristic e.g. a buck from a goat family known to produce more milk, which they would like to introduce to their future herd. All future offsprings (grandchildren) of these goats are mated with pedigree bucks in order to maintain the pedigree breed.

2. Upgrade breeding

Upgrade breeding is done where the farmer wants to introduce foreign blood to their existing goats. For instance if a farmer wants to upgrade their Galla goats by introducing German alpine blood into their herd, they will look for a German Alpine buck and let it serve their Galla female goats. The offspring (kids) born of these goats will have both the German alpine blood as well as the Galla goat blood and characteristics (also called heterosis). Upgrade breeding has various development opportunities or stages:

Foundation stage: The farmer can continue upgrading the Galla goats by serving them with pedigree German alpine goats until the future offsprings have more of German alpine characteristics than Galla goat traits. At this point, the farmer can invite an inspector recognized by the Kenya Livestock Breeders Organization (KLBO) to inspect the goats for registration with the Kenya Stud Book (KSB). The Inspector will examine the goat for particular traits that conform to the German alpine breed. If the he is satisfied with the quality of the breed, it is registered as a foundation.

Intermediate stage: If a registered foundation goat comes on heat, it is served with a pedigree German alpine buck. Any female goat produced by a registered foundation goat is called an intermediate. If an intermediate goat comes on heat, the farmer has to look for another pedigree buck of the same breed, in this case a German alpine (they should make sure that they have proper records to ensure that the first buck that served the mother or grandmother is not used as this will amount to inbreeding). If the intermediate goat produces a female goat (grand-daughter of the foundation goat), it is registered with KSB as an appendix.

Pedigree stage: When the appendix comes on heat, it is served with a different German Alpine pedigree buck; a daughter produced by the appendix is now called a pedigree. The farmer can continue the pedigree line by either serving them with pedigree bucks with particular characteristics that they want to introduce into their goats.

3. Cross-breeding

A crossbreed goat is a combination of a local breed with a foreign or exotic breed. For example, a farmer might want to serve their local goats with exotic breeds such as the Toggenburg. The offspring or daughter born of the two breeds is known as a crossbreed or F1. To improve the cross, the F1 is again served with another buck of the same breed, Toggenburg in this case. The resulting offspring is called the F2. The farmer can go further in crossbreeding by mating the F2 with another F2 goat. The resulting breed is known as the crosses or a completely new breed of goat that has no particular characteristic of any breed. The cross can be mated with other crosses until they reach the last stage called stabilization stage. The character of the new goat breed is noted and a standard set by the KSB in preparation for the registration of the new breed.