Goat (Pygmy breed)

Overall:

Pygmy Goats come in two different breeds, Nigerian dwarf goats and Pygmy. They are known for there small features and personality.Particularly, they are recongized by their short legs, deep bodies,and short neck. They are typically bred for meat or for pets. However, Nigerian dwarfs are breed for their milk production. In recent years, they have gain popular in the pet department as more pet owners and cities have regulated them as pets. They are excellent "groundskeppers" as many people just them to help maintain their lawns.

Behavior:
Pygmy Goats maybe small but have huge personalities.Pygmy goats are herd animals and like to be in large herds. They tend to thrive in larger company. Females (nannies) tend to be more docile then the males. It is common for owners to have a larger amount of female (5-6) in their group then males (1-2).

Males should be castrated at a young age to avoid behavioral problems. Both males and females have horns. These horns tend to be small but help establish a pecking order. it is important to maintain regular herding times to reduce stress in the herds. Young goats (kids) will engaged in "mock battles" by raising up on their back legs. Then they come in head to head

Diet and Feeding:

   A large portion of pygmy diets are based on good quality hay. Parts of it can be supplemented by fruits and vegetables as well as small parts of pygmy goat mix. Pygmy goats are grazers and are ruminant animals. This means they have a stomach that is composed into four parts, ruman, reticulum, omasum, and abomasum. The ruman serves as a large site for mirco-organism which act upon their foods. Hays are normal broken down through saliva then swollen to help aid digestion. Most diets recommend hays and hay like products be given to goats at all time to help aid digestion. This is also recommend in small rodent mammals, like guinea pigs, for the same reason. Goats tend to prefere legumes over grasses even though they are known for their grazing of pastures and grasses. They are forages in the the sense that they eat pretty much anything that is a grasses, forbs and browse. In kids, the rumen can take from 8 to 10 weeks to fully developed. It is during this time they relay on some grasses but more of their mother's milk.

For energy, they relay on carbohydrates and fats. Grains are high in carbohydrates and contain some fat. Mill by product, on the other hand is low in both carbohydrates and fats. Any of the grains such as corn, oats, barley or milo are good energy sources. These grains do not need to be ground because goats will chew them sufficiently for proper digestion. Rolled grains are usually more palatable than ground grains. Young goats do better on rolled grain than on whole grain because they will learn to eat grain sooner if it is rolled.

Goats need Vitamin A and Vitamin D. Vitamin A is need for upkeep of the body's lining. This can be supplied to nursing kids through mother's milk. It can also be supplied through grazing of good pastures. Yellow corn is also an excellent source because the carotene is converted to vitamin A. Vitamin D is needed for calcium and phosphorus which is used for building and repairing bones. Sunlight can convert certain steroids in the skin into vitamin D. Hay that has been sun cured is high in vitamin D but hay that is heat cured may contain no vitamin D.

The minerals that are more likely to be needed are calcium and phosphorus, iodine and selenium may also be needed in some areas. Alfalfa hay and grain can contain calcium and phosphorus. However, too much alfalfa can lead to bloating in goats.On pasture, one may want to provide a mineral mixture of equal parts of ground limestone, steamed bone meal and iodized salt. Calcium, of course, is also found in mother's milk.The feeding of high amounts of either calcium or of phosphorus will be detrimental because it unbalances the needed proportions of the two minerals.

Based on this, we can use homemade diets to determine if its health for a goat to consume this regular.

If a full grown, 40 pound goat was feed a diet of alfalfa pellets, alfalfa hay, rolled corn, and graze: orchard grass fresh, then we shorten on CP, Ca, and P. We are high in NDF though. This diet falls below what goat need on a daily bases. This could be fixed through removing some of the alfalfa pellets and hay, which is high in carbohydrates to something like mill-by product which is low in carbohydrates and fats. We may include a different grain to help build calcium levels and we do not want to eliminated alfalfa all together because it is high in calcium needed for goats.