Where do domestic goats live? Breeding goats at home for beginners: selection, care, feeding. Placement and equipment of the goat house

Dairy farming is one of the profitable branches of agriculture, keeping goats at home (can be difficult for beginners) is a special niche in this field. For the result to be positive, you must follow some rules. How should cultivation be carried out?

Breed selection

Currently, there are more than 200 breeds of goats, and even more subspecies. There are 3 groups: dairy, meat and down. Depending on what you want to achieve by breeding animals, you need to choose 1 of 3 groups. If we talk about novice livestock breeders, they are recommended to start their activities with dairy goats, since caring for them is a little easier than others.

Almost all dairy goat breeds belong to either the milk-wool or milk-meat groups. The most common dairy breeds are Saanen, Alpine, Russian White, Toggenburg and Gorky.

Downy goats can produce good milk yield, their meat has good taste, and their skins are used by furriers. Breeds of downy goats are the Don, Angora, black downy, Kyrgyz, Orenburg, white goats of Dagestan, wool, Gorno-Altai.

As for meat breeds, their meat is considered healthier than lamb, although it has similar taste qualities. Goat meat is useful for people with diseases of the circulatory, cardiac, respiratory systems, as well as for diabetics. Meat breeds - Kiko, Anatolian, Nubian, Greek, Boer. In addition to these 3 groups, there are also dwarf and decorative goats, but their breeding is quite difficult.

Animal room

Once you have decided on the breed of goats, you need to think through and arrange a goat barn for them. If you are going to have several heads, then they can be kept in any barn or utility room. The main thing is that it is equipped with everything necessary and is comfortable for the animals.

The goat room should not be damp or drafty, otherwise your goats will get sick. Humidity should not exceed 70%, and all cracks should be tightly closed in the winter so that the room does not become cold. If the goat house has thin walls, they need to be insulated.

It is better if the goat's rue is located in an open area, then the sun will illuminate and warm it. The room should have windows to provide light. To prevent goats from breaking them with their horns, they should be located at a distance of 1.5 m from the floor. It is advisable that the windows open, then you can ventilate the goat's rue. The door must open to the yard so that in the event of an emergency (for example, a fire), the animals can get out. To prevent manure from being carried into the yard, make a threshold, but a small one - 15 cm.

It is better to make the floor in the goathouse with a slope so that liquid flows down it; it is better to make a concrete or adobe floor; a wooden one will rot from manure. To disinfect the room, it is necessary to whitewash the walls with lime from the inside twice a year.

What should a goat house be equipped with?

The goat shed must have separate stalls for each animal. They should be separated from each other by a wooden stand. The size of each stall should be 1 m by 2 m. If your goats are still young, then they can be arranged 2 in 1 stall, but then the size must be increased to 2 by 2 m. To prevent the goats from stepping on the food with their hooves, side boards are needed.

The goat must be kept away from the goats, he needs a separate stall, and when the kids appear, it is necessary to fence off part of the room for them where they will live. Drinking bowls are a must, and goats especially need water. If possible, it is advisable to make an attic in the goat shed where you can store food, tools and hay.

Goat nutrition

How to care for a goat and what to feed it is the next question that worries novice livestock breeders. Goat feed is divided into dry, juicy and concentrated. All of them are necessary for the normal development of animals and the proper functioning of the gastrointestinal tract.

Juicy feed:

• grass;
• vegetable tops, they are usually mixed with crushed chalk to reduce acidity;
• silage is a very nutritious food that can be used to replace grass;
• vegetables - it is advisable to chop them;
• Fruits must be pitted.

Dry food:

• hay;
• brooms - they are made from birch, maple, poplar or aspen.

It is best to prepare dry food in mid-summer.

Concentrated feeds must be included in the diet of goats, as they contain many useful substances, but they must be given correctly so that the animals do not have an upset stomach. In order for goats to have a complete diet, they need to combine all types of feed. Norms are calculated in accordance with the age of the goats, their body weight, and general condition.

Dairy goats need more protein food, it must contain calcium and phosphorus; lactating animals need to be given more food than everyone else. In winter, goats need to be fed fatty foods. If you average, then 1 head per year will require approximately 400 kg of roughage, 500 kg of juicy feed, 30 kg of concentrated feed. Goats should be well fed, but do not overfeed them, as obesity will affect the amount of milk produced.

Winter content

If you have a goat shed without heating, then the goats definitely need to make a shelter that will protect them from frost. Goats do not like to sleep on cold ground, so they need to make a warm bed of hay. If you already have offspring by winter, then you will have to take care of heating. Goats should be kept warm.

You cannot leave goats in a goat shed all winter; they must walk at least 2 hours a day. If the weather is sunny, then more is possible. Goats should not be walked only in rain and strong winds, or if more than 30 cm of snow has fallen.

Birth of kids

Raising goats at home is not very difficult. Kids have a very high survival rate, and after a month the kids can already graze on pasture. As soon as the baby goat is born, you need to independently remove the mucus and membrane from its respiratory tract, after which it will begin to breathe and move. Then you need to give it to your mother so that she can accept it and lick it.

There is no need to immediately pick up the kid and take him to a room equipped for him, otherwise the goat will refuse to recognize him and feed him; she must lick him and accept him into the family. After birth, a kid must necessarily receive mother's milk. If the goats on your farm are intended to produce milk and earn income from it, then you should not let the mother feed the kid, otherwise she will feed him for several months, and almost all the milk will go to him. In this case, the goat must be milked, and the baby must first be fed milk from a bottle and then from a bowl.

At first (about 3 weeks), the main food for the baby will be only mother's milk; he must be fed 4 times a day. When the kid is a month old, he should be given 5 g of chalk and salt, after 2 months he can already be fed with concentrated food, introducing it into the diet gradually. There is no need to limit the young goat's water and food; it grows, and its body requires more nutrients and vitamins. The kid should definitely go for a walk, even in winter he should be taken for a walk on a sunny day.

How to milk a goat

How to keep a goat is now clear, how to raise a kid is also clear, now the question remains: how to milk it. To milk a goat without any problems, you need a special milking machine. This is a special device that facilitates the milking process. It consists of a platform where the goat is placed, and a retainer for its head. It is advisable to place a feeder near the clamp and put treats there so that the goat is busy eating and you can milk it calmly.

Lactation in a dairy goat after lambing lasts a little less than a year, in other breeds it lasts about six months. As soon as the animal has given birth, you can immediately begin milking it. Usually a goat is milked 2 times a day.

During milking, you should never scream, let alone beat, an animal, except that this is generally regarded as cruelty to animals and is unacceptable in principle; a goat may lose milk from screaming and hitting. Therefore, you need to talk to the animal kindly, stroke it, then the goat will be milked with pleasure. After all, these animals are very affectionate and always respond to good treatment with love and devotion.

It is best to milk the goat at the same time, so the animal will have less discomfort. It is not necessary to milk the milk completely to prevent the goat from developing mastitis.

Manual milking process:

• the owner sits on the side of the animal, washes and wipes the udder dry;
• massages the udder and nipple, and then grabs the nipple with the index finger and thumb;
• squeezes the nipple and pushes milk until it begins to flow from the nipple;
• the first portion must be poured into a separate container - you cannot drink it;
• After finishing milking, you need to massage the udder a little more and dry it with a towel.

Caring for a goat takes time, but these animals are not very demanding, so even a beginner in animal husbandry can cope with their maintenance and breeding. If you care for your goats correctly, and most importantly, with love, then you are guaranteed good milk yield and love from the animals.

Raising goats at home for novice livestock farmers can be an excellent way not only to obtain quality products, but also the first step towards developing their own business.

Goat breeding in Russia is not losing momentum, so products of such production are always in demand.

Let's try to understand in detail how to choose the right breed of goats, whether they have special features for caring for themselves, and whether it is profitable to keep goats. Keeping and caring for goats at home cannot be considered too troublesome if a private breeder knows everything about a goat, improves his knowledge and understands why he spends all his free time and energy.

Choosing a breed

To make livestock farming (goats, cows, poultry, etc.) not a burden, but a joy, you need to clearly decide for yourself what you expect from this activity. Before you start raising goats on your personal yard, you need to decide for what purpose the goats will be kept in the yard: for meat, milk, or for wool. This is a very important question, because the choice of animal breed depends on the answer to it.
Dairy goat breeds include:

• Russian white;
• Gorkovskaya;
• alpine;
• Saanen;
• Toggenburg;
• Mingrelian

Most often, it is for the purpose of obtaining milk that owners decide to take goats for maintenance. Since the cost of the product is very low and the market price is high, goat milk can be considered a cost-effective product.

Considering that you can expect about 5 liters of milk per day from dairy goats, it will be enough for both your own needs and for sale.

Best performance in dairy goats begins after the second lambing and can continue throughout the productive period.
Breeds of downy goats:

• Orenburg;
• Gorno-Altai;
• black down;
• arapawa;
• Pridonskaya

If a goat is properly cared for, its wool can be even more valuable than sheep’s, because it is much softer and lighter. It is also important that goat wool has good heat-insulating properties. As a rule, one goat can produce approximately 350 - 700 g of fluff. In addition to down, leather is also used to sew winter outerwear. It is important to note that downy breeds of goats also produce milk. One female can produce approximately 300 liters of milk per year.

Arapawa goat

By the way, the long hair of Arapawa goats is very valuable today. The homeland of these animals is Arapawa Island in New Zealand, from where they were brought. If such animals are domesticated, they can become excellent family goats.
If you decide to get a goat to have natural meat, then it is better to buy meat breeds. This:

• Gorky (up to 75 kg);
• Saanen (up to 100 kg);
• Boer (up to 115 kg).

As you may have noticed, the Gorky and Saanen breeds are also used to produce milk. The fact is that animals of these breeds, in addition to good milk production, are famous for the fact that they can build up large masses.

Most often, female goats that produce little milk, old or young goats are slaughtered.

It is important to note that no matter what breed you choose, you will in any case receive several products; only the amount of product produced depends on the breed. That is why keeping goats at home does not lose popularity.

Preparing the room

If you seriously decide to get these animals, you need to prepare housing for them. Keeping goats in stalls is the best option. During the warm season, the stall can be alternated with pasture. Typically, grazing lasts approximately 185 days. The rest of the time, when there is no greenery, the goats should be in the stall.

In winter the stall should be warm

1. Setting up a normal stall.
2. Maintaining proper diet.

When preparing a room for animals, you need to take into account the fact that they will be there in both warm and cold periods. Make sure in advance that temperature, humidity, lighting and ventilation are normal.
The domestic goat does not react well to too damp and dirty air, so the stall must be well ventilated. Otherwise, the animal will not grow well. In order for the goat to produce a lot of milk, the housing must be well lit during the day. You also need to make sure that the temperature in the stall is constantly maintained at 20 ° C. The limit values ​​are considered to be thermometer marks of 10 °C for adult goats and 12 °C for young animals. By the way, young animals and adult animals should be kept in different rooms. It is recommended to temporarily isolate small goats from the rest of the livestock.
It is important to note that it is best not to tie domestic goats in a stall. Naturally, there is no way to do this on a pasture, but there should be enough space in the stall for the animal to feel free.

It is important to note that if you decide to have goats in your country house, this is a bad idea.

These animals need to be looked after every day, and not just while living at the dacha. This kind of livestock farming is best done by those owners who live in the private sector.

Nutritional Features

It is difficult to imagine a goat that eats irregularly and still produces a large amount of milk. The nutrition of these animals must be complete; it is necessary to follow the regime if you want the animals to grow well. Otherwise, it will be difficult to release the exhausted livestock even for meat.

In the spring and summer, when the animal spends most of its time on pasture, it needs to be fed 2 times. Females produce their maximum milk yield in the warm season, when they feed mainly on pasture. However, this is still not enough for full lactation.

Goats' diet should be varied and nutritious.

During grazing, the goat should additionally receive:

• concentrates;
• vegetables and root vegetables;
• dry hay.

An animal needs 200 g of concentrates and up to 1 kg of vegetables per day. Dry hay can usually be given at night.
Keeping goats in winter requires a more extensive diet. Such nutrition must include:

• hay;
• corn;
• vegetables;
• silage;
• twig food;
• salt lick.

During the stall period, a goat can eat up to 3 kg of hay, 1 kg of grain and a little more than 1 kg of silage. The amount of root vegetables and vegetables should be sufficient for the animal to receive the necessary vitamins. There should always be brooms and salt licks in the stall.
Caring for goats also includes maintaining a drinking regime. During the grazing period, the animal needs to be watered three times a day: during the day - in the pasture, in the morning and evening - in the stall. When the animal is indoors around the clock, it is recommended to give water twice a day.

What should feeders be like?

When preparing the premises, special attention should be paid to the place where feeding will take place. You need to prepare special feeders for different types of food in advance.
It is recommended to make the following feeders in the stall:

1. nurseries for roughage or silage;
2. for concentrates and root vegetables;
3. drinking bowls

It is important to note that all feeders must be placed at a height of no more than 50 cm. They must also correspond to the age of the animals. When making a manger, you need to take into account the front of feeding and watering, that is, how much space one animal will take up during meals. As a rule, 30 cm is allotted for one adult animal, and 20 cm for a kid.

The largest in size should be nurseries for roughage and silage (65×75 cm), the smallest should be feeders for young animals (20×10 cm). The width and height of drinking bowls usually vary around 40x25 cm.
All feeding containers should be cleaned regularly and kept clean. If there are leftovers from a previous feeding in the feeder, they must be removed in a timely manner.

What is livestock care?

After the premises are ready for the livestock to move in, you need to familiarize yourself with information on how to care for these animals. The productivity of animals will depend on the quality of care. For example, if you decide to organize dairy goat farming, but do not clean the stall and do not care for the livestock, then goat milk will have an unpleasant specific smell, which is why hardly anyone will want to buy such products.

Goats should be kept dry and clean. This is a guarantee that neither milk nor meat will stink, and the wool will have shine. Manure must be removed regularly. To prevent animals from trampling and lying in the mud, it is enough to clean the stall once a day. This may be too difficult for beginners, but without careful and regular cleaning, all efforts to establish quality dairy goat farming will be in vain.

To keep the floor dry at all times, it can be covered with straw or peat. Typically, straw is used for wooden floors, and peat is used for concrete or brick flooring.

Since goats like to sleep on elevated surfaces, wooden beds should be installed in the stall. Adult livestock do not need to cover them with anything, but for kids it is best to line them with straw.
When breeding large livestock, one must not forget about timely trimming of hooves. If this is not done, the animals will constantly drag a heavy load, which will cause discomfort. You can trim your hooves yourself, but it is recommended to invite a specialist for the first time.

Caring for young animals

If caring for adult livestock is based on regular cleaning, then caring for young animals is more painstaking and labor-intensive. The main requirement is a warm room and isolation from adult animals. Straw or peat bedding for goat kids needs to be changed 2-3 times a day.

Baby goats need to be kept warm in winter

Sometimes the owners leave the kids to grow under the uterus. But this is only appropriate for downy breeds. If you are raising goats for milk or meat, then after birth the kids need to be transferred to a separate stall. This can only be done after they are dry.

If the kids were born in severe frosts and the temperature in the stall is below 12 °C, then they must be taken into the house or other heated room.

Within an hour after birth, the kid needs to be fed milked colostrum. With colostrum, the baby will receive all the necessary vitamins and microelements for the functioning of the digestive system and strengthening the immune system. He needs to be bottle-fed for the next 10 days, and then gradually introduced to a bowl. During the first month, goat kids need to be fed 4 times a day, later you can switch to a 3-time diet.
Gradually, the young animals need to be accustomed to dry leaves and hay, and by the end of the first month they can be given mixed feed. The initial dose is 50 g per day. The dose should be increased so that by the end of 3 months the kid eats approximately 300 g of feed per day. From 3 months, kids can be switched to adult food.

Since the young goats are very active and mobile, you need to make sure that the kids have enough space to play. If possible and weather conditions permit, it is best to release them into a pen or pasture.

What you need to know about keeping a goat

Caring for goats is not as labor-intensive as caring for a male. As a rule, it is not profitable to have a goat, so many owners only invite males to mate. If you nevertheless decide to add a goat to your household, then you need to know several important principles of its maintenance.
Goats should not be in the same stall as goats. This is due to the fact that males emit an unpleasant odor, which is quickly absorbed by the milk.

To keep a goat in shape, you need to monitor its weight.

Since males are needed only for fertilization, it is necessary to control their weight. If the goat is obese, then its sexual activity will decrease significantly. In some cases, this can even lead to infertility. Therefore, it is recommended to feed males with roughage and green food; do not overdo it with compound feed.
The breeding goat should be taken to the veterinarian regularly for examination. If the doctor confirms that the goat is healthy, then he will be able to fertilize about 50 females with a 100% guarantee. The appearance of the goat must be monitored constantly, and not just during the mating period.

Livestock breeding

Raising goats should usually begin with either the purchase of young animals or the purchase of a pregnant female (parent stock). When purchasing animals, you should definitely inquire about the pedigree, because milk production mainly depends on the heredity and breed of the goat. If the owners crossed closely related goats, then there is a high probability that their offspring will be unproductive.
For high-quality reproduction, the female must have a good physique and a proper udder. It is better to choose a goat taking into account its pedigree, because if it was born by a high-milk breeding female, then it will also be distinguished by its productivity. Considering all these features, it is best to buy animals from trusted sellers or friends, so as not to fall for the bait of unscrupulous owners. Adult goats or breeding from scratch - the choice is yours.

Usually, kids born during this period develop better than others. In addition, do not forget that the pastures will begin to turn green in April-May, so the stronger young animals can be released for grazing.

Signs of diseases

If the owners do not know how to maintain a goat correctly, the animal may get sick. Almost all animal diseases develop with the same symptoms.

The most common warning signs include:

• increased body temperature;
• lethargic behavior;
• diarrhea;
• mucous discharge from the nose;
• hot udder;
• swollen eyelids.

There is no need to start treating animals yourself; it is best to entrust this matter to a specialist. All you need to do is take proper care of your goat. After an examination and several tests, the veterinarian will make a diagnosis and prescribe medications. It is important to remember that the goat must be kept in conditions that are comfortable for it.

The goat has long been considered one of the favorite domestic farm animals. Nowadays it can be found more and more often in households. This is explained by the fact that the goat is one of the most productive animals. They make it possible to receive several liters of milk daily, which is very healthy, nutritious and tasty.

Content Benefits

Gallery: breeds of domestic goats (25 photos)

Animals are divided into three main types:

In order to have these animals on your farm, you need to familiarize yourself with each species separately, as well as learn more about each breed of this species.

Dairy

Dairy breeds appeared much later than meat goats. Initially, in ancient times, this animal was bred exclusively for its tasty and nutritious meat. Dairy goats have been with humans for over a thousand years. During this impressive time, this breed has been improved. Today the most popular dairy breeds are:

• Zanenskaya.
• Gorkovskaya.
• Nubian.
• Alpine.

Representatives of a particular breed are very easy to distinguish from each other. It is very comfortable. When purchasing, you can always determine by external data whether they are selling you the right breed.

Zanenskaya- the most highly productive and unpretentious goat of this breed. One goat can produce about eight liters of nutritious milk per day. This breed is distinguished by excellent health, it has no predisposition to goat diseases, and it also does not suffer from infectious diseases. She can live almost anywhere in the world. The individual easily gets used to different climatic conditions.

This goat eats any grass, and whether it is fresh or dried does not matter to her. The goat is completely unpretentious in food. The animal of this breed has a very soft and friendly character. She is very flexible and affectionate. A goat can recognize its owner by its voice.

The Saenen goat is not cut; its hair is short. Her productivity is very high. In order to raise this goat, no extra costs will be required. The goat is unpretentious in everything. An individual can be distinguished by its characteristic features: it has a wide chest, a spherical udder, a high neck, strong long legs, it has a wide forehead, a protruding chest, and the muscles are very developed.

Nubian- a very interesting, attractive pet. Her milk yield can reach four liters per day. In addition to being productive, this breed of goat is also fertile. On average, one goat can give birth to three to four kids per lamb. A characteristic feature of this individual is its cleanliness. She takes very good care of herself and her offspring, so there is no specific smell from this breed as such. The wool is pleasant to the touch, silky, and comes in a variety of attractive colors.

External characteristic features of the Nubian goat: slender thin legs, long neck, drooping ears, elongated body, large udder with elongated nipples. This breed has one disadvantage in keeping - they are very heat-loving animals, so they can only be kept outdoors from spring to autumn. In winter, they need to be equipped with a warm room.

Gorkovskaya- her milk yield reaches about 500 liters per year. This is a good indicator. Goats have a wonderful undercoat. If you comb it out on time, you can collect up to 400 g of beautiful fluff from one goat. A goat produces offspring from two to four kids per lamb.

Alpine- the largest goat of the dairy breed. The weight of an individual can reach 60 kg. You can milk her all year round, and in this case you can get about a hundredweight of milk from her per year. As a rule, the first time an animal brings one kid, later the same goat can lamb five kids at once.

Meat

These breeds are raised specifically to produce high-quality dietary, nutritious meat. They produce relatively little milk. A goat can produce about two liters of milk per day. Representatives of meat breeds are distinguished by their massiveness. They gain weight very quickly. At three months, a small goat can already weigh about 40 kg. The animal has a peculiar disposition; as a rule, it is unfriendly and grumpy. Treats the owner negatively. Can get cocky and fight. The most popular types are:

• Greek.
• Burskaya.

Burskaya- a very calm goat. Her attitude towards other animals and humans is almost neutral. She can be kept perfectly in a herd. Rather, this breed is an exception among meat breeds in that it is the only one that does not fight or bully. The breed is quite large. An adult can reach 90 kg, and a male - 130 kg. Its meat is highly valued, it is tasty and does not have a specific smell or taste. The Boer goat is characterized by good health. The goat is very easy to care for and does not require additional conditions when growing.

Greek- outwardly very sweet, her main advantage is productivity. This goat is so unpretentious in its maintenance that it can even stay in the open air all day long. She feels great on rocky slopes, where she can find food for herself. The milk yield of a Greek goat can reach 100 liters per year, which is a high figure for representatives of the meat breed. Its meat is highly valued; it does not have a specific smell or taste.

Mixed

This is the most versatile type for farming. From them you can get a relatively small amount of meat, milk and wool of excellent quality. A characteristic feature of this type of goat is its unpretentiousness to almost any climatic conditions. They tolerate both frost and heat well. The only thing they cannot tolerate is damp climates. A striking representative of this species is the Altai Mountain goat.

The breed was obtained by crossing Don goats with Altai goats, due to which it received constructive and productive qualities. The animal is strong, small, proportional in build. She has a wonderful undercoat. The fluff from such a goat is of high quality. You can get about 500 g of milk per day from an individual. Their meat is tender and does not have a specific smell. Down can be used to make down scarves.

The disadvantage is the crossed horns.

How to choose the right kid

When choosing, you need to consider:

Feeding conditions

Goat feeders should be installed so that they do not need to enter the pen when feeding. On one of the walls of the barn where the animals live, it is necessary to make a manger in which there will be hay. The manger can be made from metal rods; you need to attach them to the wall at about a height of half a meter. And under the manger you can put a simple box into which small stems of grass will fall. You can also add mineral supplements and salt to this box. On the opposite side of the nursery, you need to arrange a drinking bowl using the same principle.

All summer, goats can eat exclusively grass. Moreover, they eat almost any grass. In winter, you can feed goats hay. An animal needs approximately 3 kg of food for one day. Therefore, calculating how much feed one goat needs for the winter should not be difficult. In winter, brooms from various trees, prepared in the summer, should be introduced into the goat’s diet.

Brooms can be made of willow, rowan, birch. One broom per day will be enough for the animal. They are considered a nutritious and healthy addition to feed during the winter.

Keeping goats is not difficult and does not require additional expenses. The animal does not create difficulties for anyone. Goats get along well with other animals on the farm. All they need is optimal living conditions.

An animal can live in a barn, under a canopy, or in a stable. You can graze it in any meadow or clearing.

The animal is not afraid of frost; sunlight, even in excess, will only benefit it. The goat categorically does not tolerate dampness, so the room where it lives must be dry, bright and well ventilated.

In the southern regions, animals are kept simply under a canopy. In the northern regions, it is necessary to insulate the room so that in winter the room temperature is +6 - +7 degrees. If there are small kids, the temperature should not be lower than +7 - +8 degrees.

The individual can be placed in a barn with other pets, and she will get along well with everyone. If the goat is calm, you don’t have to tie it up, so it will feel calmer. If the goat tends to fight, it is necessary to tie it. It is better not to keep a goat with a milking goat, otherwise the milk will acquire an unpleasant odor. Small goats should be kept in a separate room.

Animals should not be kept in a room with a cement floor. The best option is an earthen floor. It needs to be raised about 20 cm from ground level and covered with straw. But we must not forget to make a slight slope and drainage on the floor. Then the sewage will flow down the drain, and there will be no persistent unpleasant odor in the barn.

Goats are domestic animals, the raising of which is not difficult if the farmer has at least the slightest experience in caring for some other farm animals. The main condition for raising goats is to comply with the rules of feeding and maintenance. But since care does not cause much trouble for the farmer, these animals are so popular. They even began to be called breadwinners for the poor, since goat milk is much healthier and more expensive than cow milk.

Attention, TODAY only!

Breeding goats at home for beginners is best done with one animal. You can’t expect significant income from goat breeding, but as a hobby and to improve your family’s health, you can start a small farm of several goats.

This requires some prerequisites:

Private farms get results more often in cases where goats are cared for independently with the involvement of 1-2 hired workers (for grazing, cleaning, etc.).

Basics of keeping and breeding

When organizing a goat farm, no matter large or small, certain features should be taken into account:

Which breed to choose

Based on the direction of productivity, goats are divided into downy, woolly and dairy goats. Down cattle breeding is widespread in the Volga region, Rostov, Voronezh, Dagestan, Central Black Earth Region, and Altai. The wool production zone is the North Caucasus. Dairy goat farming is developed in many regions of the Russian Federation, where animals are kept, mostly in the private sector.

Characteristics of downy animals

The following breeds of downy goats are bred in Russia:

In addition to the downy direction, dairy goats are bred everywhere in Russia.

Breeds of dairy goats

The dairy sector is represented by the following most productive species:

• The constitution of the Saanen goat is solid, lean with good bones. The body dimensions are somewhat elongated and quite wide, the head is of medium size, without horns, with erect ears, possibly with earrings. The udder is pear-shaped or ball-shaped, the teats are well defined. The skin is thin, the white fur is short. Representatives of the breed are the largest (up to 85 cm and 85 kg). During a lactation period of 11 months, the average milk yield is 700 kg.

  

• The polled (hornless) Toggenburg breed is inferior in size (75 cm) and weight (50-75 kg) to the Saanen goats. Color: shades of brown with white spots on the legs, ears, and tail. Wool up to 20 cm long. Milk yield - 500-1000 l. during the lactation period. One lamb contains 2-3 kids. You can read more about the Toggenburg goat breed in.

  

• The polled Gorky goat is similar in appearance to the Saanen goat, its color is predominantly white, its height is 62 cm, its weight is about 50 kg. During lactation, the udder becomes round, large and glandular with two developed teats. Milk yield 700-1100 kg. Lactation can last 12 months.

  

• White Russian animals were bred by folk breeders and reach 44 (goats) and 57-72 (goats) kg. Dry constitution, correct and developed physique. Individuals are polled and horned, white or black. Lactation lasts up to 8 months and is 600 liters.

  

When choosing a breed, a novice goat breeder should first decide for what purpose the animals are needed - to obtain milk or fluff, or both.

Raising kids

Newborns are wiped with a clean rag, mucus is removed from the head, the umbilical cord is cut to a length of 9-10 cm, and lubricated with 5% iodine. The hair of the queen is cut off near the udder, washed with boiled water, and the baby goat is placed.

Important. In private farms and downy goat breeding, it is practiced to raise offspring with the mother and care in this case is not particularly difficult. The young animals receive milk at any time and quickly gain weight.

With this approach, the kid constantly bothers the uterus, causing her stress, and can injure the teats with its teeth.

The most productive is kashar-base (or stall-pasture) breeding, when the babies remain indoors and are allowed close to their mother every 2-3 hours during the day and completely at night. When they reach 10 days of age, in addition to milk, goat kids begin to be given water, and at 2 weeks of age - plant food and concentrate. This method allows goats to graze in distant pastures, leaving good pasture near the estate for the grown offspring. Goats without kids are less distracted, eat better, and therefore give more milk, and the young animals do not catch colds.

On large farms, it is practiced to keep queens and kids in age groups - sakmans, who are allowed to go for a walk under normal weather conditions. In this case, the young animals are fed by hand.

This method is used exclusively for breeding dairy goats.

Feeding young animals by hand

After birth, the animal produces colostrum, which is fed to the newborn to cleanse the gastrointestinal tract and increase immunity. Then the young animals are fed milk according to the scheme shown in the table below.

Table 1. Feeding goat kids with milk

Age	Total quantity per day	Single dose
1-3 day	240 mg	20 mg
4-8 day	450 mg	75 mg
9-13 day	900 mg	150 mg
14-30 day	1000 mg	250 mg

Starting from one month of age, a mash of milk, water and flour (wheat or oatmeal) is given for 3 weeks. Subsequently, the milk is completely replaced with a thin mixture of bran (wheat). It is better to feed a baby goat until it is 3 months old.

In order for him to start drinking from the container on his own, you should bend his forelimbs and tilt his muzzle towards the container with milk. You can wet your finger in milk and, imitating a pacifier, insert it into your baby’s mouth. If necessary, repeat 3-4 times.

In addition, at the age of 2 weeks, young animals need to be accustomed to hay, and from 4 weeks - to concentrate (bran, cake, chalk, crushed oats). The offspring are gradually transferred to grazing when they are 1 month old.

Important. If you need to castrate a goat, this should be done when he reaches 3-4 weeks.

At 3.5-4 months, young animals, regardless of the direction of goat breeding, independently eat grass, roughage, and concentrates. It's time to take him away from the uterus. This is done over a week, gradually increasing the time of separation from the goat. Before weaning from the mother, the kid is given crushed oats, bran, and flour (200-400 g per day). After weaning - concentrates (200-300 g). A strict regime and the best pasture are important components of the development and health of kids.

Video - Raising kids: under a goat or feeding

A prerequisite for increasing the productivity of goats is the creation of the necessary conditions for their maintenance. This may include:

• construction and arrangement of a good goat house;
• walking;
• feeding;
• watering;
• care.

Goats are bred using stall, stall-pasture and grazing methods. The latter is common in the southern mountainous regions for goats for meat, wool and down production. The first two are universal and are designed for dairy and down-producing animals, and with the stall method, it is necessary to provide good walking.

If with the pasture method animals can occasionally be content with sheds, then for stall and mixed types of housing a room is required. Depending on the region and the availability of materials, it is built from wood, brick, foam concrete blocks, stone, brushwood, adobe, reeds with clay.

Goat house

The place for it should be somewhat removed from residential buildings according to sanitary standards and should not be in a lowland, since flooding with melt water is possible, and goats cannot tolerate dampness.

The size of the goat house is selected taking into account the number, sex and age of animals. The minimum standards are presented in the table below.

Table 2. Goat's rue size

group	corral	walking
adult goat	1,60	2,60
goat + 1 kid	1,90	3,20
goat + 2 kids	2,30	3,60
goat + 3 kids	2,60	4,00
kid up to 3 months	0,40	0,60
kid 3-6 months	0,60	0,60
kid 6-12 months	1,60	1,30
breeding goat	3,00	2,60

The floor in the pen is made of wood, sawdust is poured on top, and covered with lattice flooring. The sawdust is changed every week.

They also provide a milking compartment in the goat shed, a place for kids and breeding goats, and for storing feed.

In front of the building, a walking area is fenced off, which is protected from bad weather and sun. On it, animals will wait out bad weather and rest after returning from pasture.

To organize proper care, the goat's rue should not be cramped. If the livestock is small, then the area is increased to:

• 2 m – for 1 goat;
• 3.5-4 m – for a goat with kids;
• 1.3 – for 1 kid 6-12 months.

The height of the section should be 160 cm.

The walls of the room are periodically whitened (1 kg of lime per 5 liters of water). In the spring or early summer, when the goats have been on pasture for a long time, it becomes possible to wash the goat's rue with creolin or a similar disinfectant, then you need to ventilate the room well.

Important. The temperature in the building should be 12-16 degrees in winter and 19-22 in summer. The cracks should be caulked and the doors should be insulated from the outside.

They install a nursery for providing hay, brooms and a feeder for silage, root crops and concentrate. The nurseries and feeders are kept clean and cleared of food residues before feeding so as not to cause disruptions in the goats’ digestion.

In windless winter weather, animals should be taken out into the yard and fed there. Fresh air increases appetite and improves immunity. With proper installation of the feeder, the loss of haylage does not exceed 2-3%.

Ventilation must be provided in the goat shed. It is done taking into account:

• manure removal method;
• the amount of heat generated by goats;
• thermal insulation of the room
• total humidity;
• way of keeping animals.

Ventilation ensures constant air exchange in accordance with animal hygiene standards.

Features of care

Cleanliness of animals is one of the main conditions in keeping goats. Dirty hair near the tail and on the limbs should be trimmed and overgrown horny parts of the hooves should be trimmed.

Hooves: how to care

The horny growth of the hoof is a dead tissue of the epidermis, which is constantly renewed. The walls of the hoof and soles wear down with constant movement on pastures, but this does not happen in stable conditions. Hoof growth occurs faster than abrasion - this leads to bends, cracks and other deformations.

Pruning is carried out 3 times a year. Soft hoofs are trimmed more often than hard hoofs. In goats, manipulations are carried out for the first time when they reach 2.5-3 months. This is done with the following tool:

• pruning shears or special scissors;
• a knife for trimming the underside of the hooves;
• file and sandpaper to smooth out irregularities.

The procedure is carried out using a disinfectant solution. When trimming, the goat needs to be secured while standing and the sole should be carefully cleared with a knife to the elastic tissue. Scissors are used to straighten the hoof. After that, the plantar edge and the protrusions of the walls are rounded with a file and sandpaper. After this, the position of the leg in general and the hoof in particular is checked by placing the animal on a solid plane.

If blood appears during manipulations, then treat with a disinfectant solution.

Rules for caring for hair and skin

Brushing increases blood circulation, helps replace old hair with young hair, and removes various impurities. Brushing prevents the fur from becoming tangled. It can be performed with brushes designed for horses and dogs with varying degrees of rigidity and configuration.

These animals are clean and rest on dry bedding. With insufficient quantities and infrequent shifts, goats are forced to lie down in damp conditions, which leads to diseases and a decrease in milk yield.

How to feed correctly

Each goat farmer composes the menu as he considers the most rational. But, since French livestock breeders are leaders in this industry, their recommendations should be followed.

During the dry period, the future queen is given the following amount of feed.

Table 3. Amount of feed for a pregnant goat

If the animal has a tendency to swelling of the nipples or udder, then a week before giving birth, the feeding of carrots and beets is stopped, and compound feed is also eliminated two days before the birth. After childbirth, they drink sweet water. For seven days after birth, they are fed with brooms and hay.

Table 4. Food for goats in the first months of lactation

feed	daily milk yield 3 l (g)	daily milk yield 4 l (g)	daily milk yield 5 l (g)	daily milk yield 6 l (g)
hay	1800	1800	2000	2500
carrots, beets	2500	3000	3000	3000
barley	800	1000	1200	1200
soybean meal	-	50	100	150
salt	13	14	15	16

Table 5. Amount of feed for goats depending on daily milk yield

feed	daily milk yield 3 l (g)	daily milk yield 4 l (g)	daily milk yield 5 l (g)	daily milk yield 6 l (g)
grass	7000	7000	7000	7000
hay	-	1000	2000	3000
barley	250	500	750	1000
salt	20	20	20	20

After the end of lactation (3 months), animals with a daily milk yield of 1 liter are given:

• hay – 1000 g;
• spring straw – 1000 g;
• barley – 400 g;
• carrots, beets – 1500 g;
• salt – 11 g.

With a daily milk yield of 2 liters:

• hay – 1500 g;
• spring straw – 1000 g;
• barley – 400 g;
• carrots, beets – 2000 g;
• salt – 11 g.

Important. When composing a diet, you should take into account the calorie content and balance of the feed. For goats, the sugar to protein ratio should be 0.5-0.8.

Whatever the inherent productivity of the breed, without proper feeding, maintenance and care, one cannot expect much return.

Goat breeding is a fairly profitable branch of household farming. A variety of valuable products are obtained from goats: milk, fluff, wool, meat, and skins. Goat milk is a valuable food product, especially for infants. It is rich in calcium salts, which makes it an excellent remedy against rickets.

Goat milk is consumed not only in its whole form; cheeses, butter, curdled milk, kefir and other products are also prepared from it.

In Russia, dairy goats are bred in all zones. The best in milk productivity are Russian dairy goats and their offspring: Gorky, Yaroslavl, Valdai, Ryazan and others.

In a number of regions of the country, crosses from the Saanen goat breed and local goats, known for their high milk productivity, are common.

Goat milk contains an average of 4-5 and up to 7 percent fat. The average live weight of adult dairy goats is 40-50 kilograms. Their precocity in most regions of Russia is quite satisfactory: at the age of 7-9 months, female goats weigh 20-25 kilograms, and male goats 25-30 kilograms.

Under satisfactory housing and feeding conditions, dairy goats produce about 400 liters of milk per year during lactation. With improved housing and feeding, the annual milk yield of goats often increases to 500-700 liters, reaching 800-1000 or more liters in the best dairy goats, while the lactation period lasts up to 9-10 months.

Choosing a Dairy Goat

When choosing (buying) a goat, the main attention should be paid to the health and physique of the animal, its milk production and age. A healthy goat has a cheerful appearance, smooth, shiny hair that evenly covers the entire body, thin and dense skin that easily stretches on the thighs. The goat's physique should be strong, all parts of the body should be well developed.

A well-built dairy goat has a deep, fairly wide chest with convex long ribs, a wide straight back, a wide croup without drooping (a slight drooping croup is typical of goats), a fairly voluminous belly, straight and wide-set legs with strong hooves. The bones should be strong, well developed, the body should be long, slightly barrel-shaped. Good body shape indicates good health of the animal and, to a large extent, good productivity. The milk production of a goat is best checked by recording the daily milk yield over several days. However, in most cases it is necessary to evaluate goats by external examination.

In a dairy goat, the udder is voluminous, pear-shaped or spherical, not overgrown with coarse hair, elastic to the touch, not saggy, with thin elastic skin, without hardening, venous vessels (milk veins) are noticeable on it. After milking, such an udder falls off and the skin gathers into small wrinkles. It should be borne in mind that the udder, although large, does not fall off after donkey, is considered fatty. Also considered vicious is a drooping (poorly suspended) udder, dangling when walking from side to side, divided by a groove into two lobes, the shape of the udder of goats with small, short nipples, in which dong is difficult. The nipples should be of medium size, directed slightly forward to the sides. Goats close to the dry period usually have smaller udders.

Dairy goats have wool of varying lengths and quality. However, this sign can not be taken into account when assessing the milk productivity of an animal.

Goats with moderate length hair are better in that they are easier to care for. Goats with wool with a high content of fluff tolerate cold better.

Color, the presence or absence of earrings on the neck, the shape and length of the ears and other characteristics are not related to milk production, and therefore have no practical significance when choosing a goat.

A goat gives the highest milk yield after the 2-3rd lambing. Starting from 6-7 years of age, milk yield usually decreases.

The age of a goat can be determined by its teeth. An adult goat has 32 teeth: on the upper jaw there are 12 molars (6 on each side), on the lower jaw 20, of which 12 molars (6 on each side) and 8 incisors. Age is determined by the presence and structure of incisors. Determining the age of goats by their teeth At birth, goat kids usually have no teeth or only the rudiments of the first pair of primary incisors, the so-called toes. By the age of a week, the hooks are fully formed; by the age of a month, the remaining six incisors grow. Until the age of one, all incisors in goats are deciduous; from this time they begin to fall out and are replaced by permanent ones, which are sharply different from deciduous ones. They are wider and larger than dairy ones. By 15-18 months, the first pair of permanent incisors grows in place of the lost primary incisors. By the age of 2-2.5 years of life, the second pair of primary incisors is replaced. By the age of 3, the third pair is replaced, and by the age of 3-4, the last pair of the outermost incisors is replaced. By this time, all the incisors have the shape of wide spatulas.

Determining the further age of goats by teeth is more difficult and less accurate; it is made by the degree of wear of the incisors and the size of the gaps formed between them:

• By the age of 5, all the incisors are worn away and the rubbing surface begins to take on an oval shape.
• At the age of 6, the incisors have a rounded shape, and gaps appear between them.
• By the age of 7, they are severely worn out, thinned out and begin to stagger and fall out.
• By the age of 8, usually only stumps remain from part of the incisors, the teeth become even more wobbly and easily fall out. Goats with such teeth do not chew food well and are not suitable for economic use.

Teeth wear is affected by health and the quality of food consumed. In goats in good health and fed soft food (grass, fine hay, crushed grain), teeth wear out more slowly.

The age of goats is determined in the same way as that of goats.

Keeping goats at home

The room for goats should be dry, bright, with good ventilation, but without drafts. To ventilate the goat house, install an exhaust pipe with a valve at the bottom, which is opened as needed.

For better air draft, the pipe from the ceiling to the roof is insulated with sheathing made of straw mats coated on the outside with clay mortar, and above the roof the pipe is made with double walls with insulating backfill. A shield is placed over the top edge of the pipe to prevent rain and snow from entering the pipe. The air temperature in the goat shed should be 6-7 degrees Celsius in winter, but if there are young goats with the goats, then 8-10 degrees. In the summer, when goats are driven indoors only at night, the goat shed should be cool and not stuffy.

In front of the goat shed (or barnyard) it is necessary to build a small courtyard with a fence, where goats can be kept during the day during the winter in favorable weather.

The windows in the goat shed are placed on the south side, at a height of at least 1.50-1.75 meters from the floor, so that the goats cannot break the glass. The floor can be plank, adobe or earthen, raised above ground level by about 20 centimeters

To drain the slurry, it is made with a slope of 2 centimeters for every meter of floor. If there are several goats on the farm, it is recommended to partition the premises into separate stalls and equip them with doors for keeping goats without a leash. In the goat shed there are nurseries for roughage and feeders for concentrates, silage and root crops.

Along one of the two walls of the room, it is recommended, depending on the number of goats, to arrange shelves 50-60 centimeters wide that rise above the floor (40-50 centimeters). Goats like to climb onto these shelves and sleep; in this case, they get less cold and their fur becomes less dirty.

The room for goats must be ventilated more often, manure removed from it and bedding changed. From time to time, the walls in the goat shed should be whitened with a lime solution (1 kilogram of quicklime per bucket of water).

In winter, in good weather (with frost up to 12 degrees, without wind), goats should definitely be driven out into the yard and fed here: this improves health and increases productivity. Goats are fed indoors only during inclement weather and during severe frosts. Keeping it clean protects animals from disease. Dirty hair (on the thighs and around the tail) should be trimmed regularly and carefully trimmed as the hooves grow out. Short-haired goats are brushed daily with a stiff brush.

In the spring, as soon as the soil dries out and the grass has grown sufficiently, goats begin grazing. Goats make good use of all types of pastures, with the exception of wet and swampy ones; when grazing on wet pastures, which are usually infected with worms, the goats get sick and often die.

To avoid digestive upset, goats should be transferred from stall housing to pasture housing gradually, over 7-10 days. On the first day, goats are allowed to pasture for no more than 1 hour, on the second day for 1-2 hours, and so the duration of grazing is gradually increased.

In the first days, the goats are given the previously established feed supply. Then, as the time spent on grazing increases, in the morning before pasture and in the evening upon returning from pasture, they are given 0.5 kilograms of hay. After the grass has grown sufficiently and the pasture allows the animals to meet the need for pasture, feeding the animals with hay is stopped. With good grass coverage, the goat eats 7-8 kilograms of grass on the pasture; this amount of grass ensures a milk yield of 2.5-3 liters. With a higher milk yield, the goat must be fed in the morning, before being put out to pasture, and in the evening, upon returning from the pasture, with other feed: concentrates, root vegetables, silage, kitchen waste, etc.

When grazing near the farm, in order to avoid poisoning, goats must be grazed on a leash.

To protect the trees from damage, it is recommended to gird the goat with a chest strap, which passes between the front legs and is attached at one end to the halter, and at the other to a special belt covering the body behind the shoulder blades.

Such a belt allows you to move freely, but prevents the goat from standing on its hind legs and eating tree branches.

It is best to drink with well water or water from rivers, streams and springs; before drinking, the water should be warmed by pouring it into a wooden barrel in advance.
Puddles, swamps and ponds with stagnant water are a source of infection of goats with worms and other diseases, and therefore are unsuitable for watering.

In the summer, milking and suckling queens with kids need to be watered twice: in the morning before the heat sets in and at 4-5 o’clock in the afternoon. In spring and autumn, if there is lush grass on the pasture and it is not hot, goats can be given water once in the afternoon or in the evening, after returning from the pasture. Hot goats should not be allowed near water. This can lead to illness in animals.

During the entire grazing period, goats should be given salt daily in troughs at a watering hole or in a goat's barn.

Feeding dairy goats

Proper, complete feeding is the most important condition for high milk production of a goat:

1. Properly feeding a goat means regularly giving it so much food and of such quality that it, while maintaining normal fatness, gives the highest productivity.
2. A large goat requires more nutrients than a small, young goat that grows more than an adult goat of the same weight.
3. A pregnant goat that is developing a fetus should be given more feed than a dry goat, a milking goat more than a dry goat, and a goat with a high milk yield more than a goat with little milk yield.
4. The higher the milk yield, the more varied and nutritious the feed should be.

Roughage

For proper digestion, the goat should be given at least one, but no more than 2.5-3 kilograms of roughage per head per day. Goats most readily eat fine grass meadow and forest hay. The normal daily supply of hay to a goat is 2-2.5 kilograms. Half of the daily requirement of hay can be replaced with branches (wood hay). The nutritional value of 2 kilograms of dried branches with leaves is equal to 1 kilogram of meadow hay.

Branch food (brooms) is harvested in June–July. Poplar, maple, willow, birch, aspen, ash, linden, acacia, hazel, hornbeam, elm, rowan and willow, as well as heather shrubs are suitable for this purpose. The branches are cut 50-60 centimeters long and about 1 centimeter thick at the lower end (butt) and tied into bundles 10-12 centimeters thick at the dressing site. The brooms are hung under a canopy, in the attic and in other well-ventilated rooms, protected from rain and sun and dried for 10-15 days. Later they are stored in a dry place. During the stall period, you can feed 3-5 brooms per day per head . A more suitable food is dry leaves of tree species, cleared of soil. To harvest brooms and leaves, you can use selective felling when caring for tree plantations and old trees, and a limited number of branches need to be cut from each tree.

The preparation of roughage is carried out taking into account the duration of the stall period. For example, for a stall period of 6 months, it is necessary to prepare an average of 380-420 kilograms of meadow hay for an adult goat. Half of the total hay requirement can be replaced with double the amount of well-dried brooms or one and a half times the amount of dry leaves. For one head of young animals aged from 6 to 12 months, 250-270 kilograms of hay are required to be prepared for a stall period of the same duration.

Concentrated feed

Concentrated feed is 2-3 times higher in nutritional value than hay. Oats, barley, corn grains, bran can be given to an adult animal up to 1 kilogram per day per head and kids up to 500 grams, cake up to 800 and 400 grams, respectively.

Before feeding, grain feed should be crushed, the cakes should be given in finely crushed form, the bran should be slightly moistened with water so that it does not spray and cause coughing in animals. All concentrated feeds are best given to animals in the form of a mixture.

Juicy feed

The best succulent food is green grass. During the stall period and during periods of burning of pastures, succulent forages such as silage, potatoes and root crops replace green pasture.

They are also a source of vitamins that are of great importance for the health and normal development of the body. Juicy feed is a good milk extractor. In addition, they are good for digestion.

Fodder beets, carrots, rutabaga, turnips should be given raw after preliminary grinding, 2-4 kilograms per day per adult goat and up to 1 kilogram per kid aged 6-10 months. Potatoes are fed 1-2 kilograms per head, preferably boiled or baked.

Corn and any other silage is good, juicy food. It is given to dairy goats in quantities of up to 3 kilograms, to pregnant queens and young animals up to 2 kilograms per day per head.

Goats also eat well beet and carrot tops and cabbage leaves, the permissible limit is up to 3-4 kilograms per day per head.

Potato peelings, table scraps and other food waste, readily eaten by goats, are best given sprinkled with bran or crushed grain.

Mineral supplements

Throughout the year, animals should be given salt: 6-8 grams per single queen and 10 grams per mated queen per day.

In the second half of pregnancy, for the formation of the skeleton of the fetus, and for kids from one month of age, for the development and strengthening of the skeleton, they should be given crushed chalk or bone meal: for the queens, 20 grams, and for kids, 7-10 grams per day per head.

Goat Feeding Routine

Only fresh food is suitable for feeding. Spoiled feed harms the health of animals, reduces milk yield, and worsens the quality of milk.

Goats need to be fed 3-4 times a day. The best times for feeding three times a day are: 6-7 am, 12-1 pm and 6-7 pm. The intervals between feedings should be as equal as possible. Violation of the feeding schedule reduces milk yield.

Goats should be milked after feeding. Feeds are given in a certain sequence. If all types of feed are fed in one cottage, then concentrated feed is given first, then succulent feed and finally roughage. Each subsequent food is given after the previously given one has been eaten. In the evening it is recommended to feed easily digestible food. Food scraps and silage are best fed in the morning or afternoon when animals are on the move.

We can recommend the following approximate schedule for feeding and milking goats: in the morning giving concentrates and root vegetables, then milking, watering, giving hay, at noon giving root vegetables, or silage, or kitchen scraps (swill), then milking, giving hay (or a little hay and 1 -2 brooms), in the evening giving concentrates, milking, watering, at night they put hay or spring straw and one broom in the feeder.

Goats should be given water only with clean, good quality, not cold water (temperature 6-10 degrees). Drinking cold water causes colds.

They give water twice a day after feeding, give 2.5-4 liters of water per head at each watering.

Goats should not be given warm water. This pampers the animals and often leads to colds in winter. To heat the water to the air temperature in the goat house, it is recommended to have a clean tank, which is filled with water every evening. The next day in the morning, the water from the tank can already be used to water the goats.

Before feeding and drinking water, it is necessary to clean the nurseries, feeding troughs and watering troughs (or buckets) of food residues, dirt and water.

Milking goats and udder care

A goat's milk production largely depends on proper milking and skillful udder care. During milking, it is best to place the goat in the pen. She stands calmly in the machine and does not interfere with milking.

When grazing in a public herd, goats are milked in the morning and evening in pens, and in the afternoon in the pasture.

Goats should always be milked at the same time. When raising kids without a uterus, in the first days after lambing, the goat is milked four times a day, then gradually switches to three times milking, and as the milk yield decreases, to two times.

With triple milking, the first milking is carried out at 4-5 am, the second at 12 noon, the third at 7-8 pm, with double milking at 5 am and at 7 pm.

Before milking, you should thoroughly wash the udder with warm water and wipe it dry with a clean towel. The best way to milk is with your fist. Before and at the end of milking, the udder is massaged. Massage increases milk yield. It is better to massage each half of the udder in turn. To do this, grab one half of the udder with both hands and rub it on all sides, lifting the udder slightly up and squeezing it a little, then, continuing to massage, lower the udder down. Such massage techniques are repeated 4-5 times with each half of the udder, and then the milk is milked out. The first streams of milk are not poured into the milk pan, as they are usually contaminated. It is necessary to milk the goat as carefully as possible; the last milk is the fattest. Milking should be done quickly, without interruption.

At the end of milking, the udder should be wiped with a dry towel and the nipples should be lubricated with Vaseline.

After use, milk utensils must be thoroughly washed with hot water, then rinsed with clean water and dried.

Combing down and trimming goat hair

In the pre-spring period, the goat's fluff begins to come out, and if it is not combed out in time, it will become confused. Therefore, goats should be combed out as soon as the fluff begins to shed on their sides. This work is carried out in the European part of Russia at the end of February and in March, in Central Asia and Transcaucasia in February, in Siberia and the northern regions in April. The fluff is combed out twice: the first time at the beginning of molting, the second after 2-3 weeks, at the end of molting.

To avoid miscarriage, fluff removal from goats in the last period of pregnancy is carried out after lambing. To prevent loss, fluff should be combed in a bright room protected from the wind. While the hair is being combed, the goat is tied by its horns to a hook near the wall or placed on a low table with its legs tied. The fluff is combed out with a comb shaped like a small spatula with a wooden handle. The widened part of the spatula has 7-8 teeth, and the more frequent combs have 12-14 teeth. The teeth are made of steel wire with a diameter of 3 millimeters, the upper part of the teeth is bent in a semicircle, the ends are slightly blunted.

At first, the fleece is combed with a rare comb, while plant debris and manure are removed from it and only a small part of the fluff is combed out, and then they begin to comb the fluff with frequent combs.

The fluff is combed from the back to the belly, without pressing on the comb, so as not to injure the skin.

Depending on the breed, as well as the conditions of feeding, maintenance and care, the amount of fluff per goat ranges from 80 to 200 grams, sometimes more.

After combing out the fluff, as soon as warm weather sets in, begin cutting the wool. The average amount of wool sheared from one goat is 300-500 grams.

You can comb out the fluff and cut the hair only on goats with a dry coat and after keeping them for 10-12 hours without food or water. Fed and watered animals do not tolerate brushing and shearing well, and there may even be cases of death from volvulus.

Only completely dry wool and dry fluff are suitable for long-term storage.

Rules for raising goats at home

It is impossible to mate animals that are closely related, since in this case less viable offspring with less productivity are born. In addition, inbreeding often results in the birth of freaks.

Healthy parents with good constitution and high productivity tend to produce good, healthy and highly productive offspring.

Particular attention should be paid to the choice of a sire. The goat must be healthy, have good live weight and height, strong bones, developed chest, straight back, wide rump, strong, well-spaced legs. It must necessarily come from a highly milky mother, since milkiness is inherited and through the producer.

Pregnancy in goats lasts 5 months. It is recommended to breed goats in August, September, or at most in October, then lambing will take place in January, February or March, at which time the queens produce the most viable, well-developed offspring.

By the beginning of grazing at this lambing time, the kids have time to become well strengthened, they already have twenty teeth and can use the most nutritious spring pastures. Of course, to organize lambing at the specified time, the farm must be provided with warm goat meat and a sufficient amount of feed.

In the absence of these conditions, goats hatch in November or early December, then lambing occurs in the spring (April-May), when a warm room is not required and green pasture is available for the queens. However, kids of spring lambing are not able to use pasture, very nutritious food, and by the fall, by the time they are kept in stalls, they are usually inferior in development to kids of earlier lambing.

Goats can only be found while hunting. Goat hunting lasts 24-48 hours, and sometimes more. Signs of heat include frequent bleating, restless behavior, loss of appetite, tail wagging, swelling of the outer part of the vagina and the discharge of mucus from it. If the goat is not fertilized in the first heat, it must be done in the second heat, which is usually repeated after 15-22 days. If there are two goats on the farm, it is better to breed them at different times, so that lambing occurs at different times and milk can be obtained throughout the year.

The life expectancy of goats is on average 9-10 years, the period of economic use is 7-8 years.

In goats, the first heat appears at 5-8 months of age. However, early mating has a detrimental effect on the growth and development of males and females and produces weak, poorly developed offspring. Therefore, bucks and goats should be allowed to mate no earlier than one and a half years of age.

It is most advisable to organize manual mating of goats, in this case you can always know exactly the time of mating of the goat and determine the time of its lambing. In case of free mating, when the goat walks in a herd, it is difficult to determine the covering time. In addition, the goat quickly becomes exhausted and loses its productive capacity. With manual mating, a goat aged 2-7 years can cover 60-80 or more goats during the breeding season (45 days). During free mating, the load on the goat should not exceed 25-30 queens in order to avoid large barrenness.

By the time of mating, goats and bucks should be in a state of average body condition.

In order for the fetus to develop normally, the queens must be well fed throughout pregnancy, especially in the second half. In the last month of pregnancy, the goat should be given nutritious feed, for example, good hay, bran, etc. To avoid stomach diseases and prevent miscarriages, the queens should not be fed poor-quality or frozen feed and given very cold water.

Milking must be stopped 1-1.5 months before lambing, since during this period a large amount of nutrients is required for fetal development. The goat should be introduced gradually. After each milking, it is imperative to milk all the milk from the udder to prevent disease.

In good weather, goats should be given short walks in the walking yard.

10-15 days before lambing, the room should be cleared of manure and disinfected with 5 percent creolin or milk of lime, all cracks in the walls should be sealed to avoid drafts, and dry straw should be laid on the floor.

The onset of labor is quite easy to notice: the goat begins to worry, lies down, gets up, bleats pitifully, her udder becomes large in volume, and her vagina swells. If the udder is too full of milk, the goat is milked.

A healthy goat usually gives birth easily. In the normal position of the fetus, when the kid comes out with the front legs on which the head rests, the birth ends quickly. If the fetus is not positioned correctly, labor will be delayed, in which case it is necessary to seek help from veterinary personnel.

A goat often brings two, and often more, kids, with the second and third kids being born either immediately after the first, or after a short period of time. A newborn goat should immediately be freed (with a clean hand) of mucus from the mouth, eyes and nose and placed on the uterus so that it can lick the kid, or wipe it dry with a clean rag or a bunch of soft hay. The kid's umbilical cord should be cut off at a distance of 6-8 centimeters from the belly and the end of the cord should be lubricated with iodine, then the kid should be placed in the same room in a warm, dry place.

In 1-1.5. hours after birth, the birth membranes come out, the placenta, which must be immediately removed and buried. If the placenta lingers for more than 4-5 hours, you need to seek help from veterinary personnel. Under no circumstances should the placenta be forcibly removed.

After the end of labor, milk is given off from a profusely milking goat, otherwise the udder will become coarse and an inflammatory disease may occur. 1-1.5 hours after birth, the goat is given warm water.

For the first 1-3 days after lambing, the queen should be fed moderately nutritious, easily digestible food, for example, good hay, a warm mash of flour or bran (200-300 grams every 3-4 hours), and fresh grass. In the future, feeding is gradually increased at the expense of such feeds as bran, root vegetables, and silage.

After the cat, the first milking of the goat is carried out after 1 Ug -2 hours. The first streams of colostrum are milked into a separate container. This colostrum is unsuitable for kids, as it contains many pathogenic microbes, which during pregnancy penetrate into the milk ducts of the nipples.

In the first days, the goat is milked four times a day, before each feeding of the kids. From the beginning of the second month after lambing, they switch to triple milking.

Raising young animals

There are two ways to raise goat kids: under the uterus and without them. Raising goat kids under the uterus is practiced only for goats with low milk production. With this method, kids are kept with their uterus until they are 3-4 months old. When lambing in winter, as soon as the kids are strong enough, they are released into the fresh air for several hours (in good, not very frosty weather), and during spring lambing, from 6-10 days of age, in warm weather the kids are kept together with the queen on pasture.

From the age of 20 days or a month, kids must be given mineral supplements: 5 grams of salt, 5-7 grams of bone meal or crushed chalk per head per day. By 2-3 months of age, the daily dose of bone meal or chalk is increased to 10 grams.

Weak kids need to be fed with concentrates from 20-30 days of age, initially 30-50 grams, and by 3 months of age up to 200-300 grams per kid per day. At 3 months of age, kids are gradually, over 7-10 days (with access to the uterus for feeding every other day), weaned from the uterus. After weaning, milking of the queens begins.

Raising queenless kids is usually used when breeding goats with good milk production. With this method, baby goats that are born are immediately weaned from their mothers and fed from a bottle with a rubber nipple or from a cup with fresh milk or milk heated to a temperature of 38 degrees.

Goats must be fed colostrum, as it helps cleanse the stomach of original feces; in addition, colostrum contains substances that subsequently protect the kid from various diseases.

Until the age of one month, goat kids are fed four times a day every 4-5 hours. The first milk supply is given at 5 o'clock in the morning, the last at 8 o'clock in the evening, in winter at 6 o'clock in the morning and at 8 o'clock in the evening. Feeding scheme for kids:

Feeding kids raised without queens

Age of kids (in days)	Number of feedings per day	Whole milk	Oatmeal wet	Concentrates	Roots
		per day (in grams)	per day (in grams)	per day (in grams)	per day (in grams)
1-2	4	800	—	—	—
3	4	900	—	—	—
4-5	4	1000	—	—	—
6-10	4	1200	—	—	—
11-20	4	1200	200	—	—
21-30	4	1200	300	30	—
31-40	3	1050	500	50	40
41-50	3	750	700	100	60
51-60	3	450	800	150	100
61-70	3	450	800	200	200
71-80	3	450	—	200	250
81-90	3	450	—	300	250

Depending on the feed available on the farm, certain changes may be made to the scheme.

Oatmeal is cooked daily, filtered, cooled and lightly salted. Root vegetables are fed finely chopped. From 10 days of age, a small amount of good hay or brooms is placed in the feeders and they begin to give 4-6 grams of salt per day.

From the first day of birth, goat kids must be given plenty of clean, not cold water. After each feeding, cups and all milk utensils are washed with hot water and dried. From 6-10 days of age, goat kids are allowed out for a walk every day in good weather for 3.5-5 hours, and from 3-4 weeks of age they begin to graze on pasture.

From 3 weeks of age, goat kids are fed concentrates: bran, rolled oats, crushed cake (preferably a mixture of them), adding 8 - 10 grams of crushed chalk or bone meal per head per day.

With proper rearing, the live weight of the kid should increase by 3-5 kilograms every month until the age of 6 months.

From 7-8 months of age, when kids are transferred to stall housing, they should be given 1.5-1.6 kilograms of hay, 200-300 grams of concentrates and 0.8-1 kilograms of silage or root crops (tubers) daily. On this diet, young animals grow and develop well.