Methods and Technical Key Points for Feeding Black Goats with Green Forage

How do farmers use green forage to feed black goats? There are many ways to raise black goats: grazing, pellet feed feeding, and feeding with agricultural by-products. Nowadays, many people have also started using green forage grass to raise black goats, which is also a relatively good breeding method. Using green forage to feed black goats in rural areas is beneficial: green forage has comprehensive nutrition, good palatability, is easy to digest, has a wide range of sources, and is low in cost, making it one of the important feeds for black goat breeding. Weiyan Black Goat Breeding Base has planted green forage pasture grass and adopts a combination of free-range and penned rearing, which effectively improves the disease resistance of black goats and stabilizes their production performance. Raising sheep with green forage is especially suitable for rural household sheep raising: simple and hassle-free, with small capital and big returns.

When raising black goats in pens with green forage, attention should be paid to the following issues:

1. Harvest at the appropriate time. In the young and tender stage, the content of protein, minerals, and vitamins is relatively high, while crude fiber is relatively low, making it easy to digest. Green forage at this stage is most suitable for feeding sheep.

2. Green forage must be kept fresh and clean, and prevented from becoming moldy and rotten. Note that green forage that has just been sprayed with pesticides must not be fed to sheep.

3. Green forage can be fed fresh, or fed after drying in the sun. It can also be chopped, pulped, fermented, or fed after ensiling.

4. Properly match with other feeds. According to the different growth stages of black goats, ensure that black goats' needs for various nutrients are met. The daily forage and feed of black goats should be stable. If black goats are raised in pens, their forage and feed should be relatively stable to prevent sudden changes during the sheep fattening period, especially intensive fattening or rapid fattening, which requires relatively stable forage and feed. If suddenly changed, it will inevitably cause changes in the rumen environment, directly affecting the rumen microbial flora and fermentation activity, leading to reduced fermentation degree and digestibility and absorption rate of forage and feed, and even causing digestive tract diseases.

Green forage and concentrate should be fed to black goats separately. When black goats are hungry, the gastrointestinal tract will secrete a large amount of digestive fluid. Concentrate feed is rich in nutrition, small in volume, low in crude fiber, good in palatability, high in quality, easy to digest, and easy to absorb, so it is best to feed concentrate first. If green forage and concentrate are mixed to feed sheep, because green forage is large in volume and high in moisture, it will reduce the digestibility and absorption utilization rate of concentrate feed. Therefore, when feeding black goats, it is best to feed them separately. (Contributed by Rural Notes)