Bottle Feeding Baby Goats
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Once your kids arrive, you will need to decide if they will be dam-raised or if you will be bottle-feeding baby goats. There are reasons you might choose to bottle feed from promoting friendliness to managing the dam’s udder. Or you may be forced to bottle-feed because for one reason or another the dam can’t or won’t let the kids nurse or a kid is too weak or compromised to nurse. Whatever the reason, if you are planning on bottle-feeding, you likely have many questions including:
- What kind of milk to feed baby goats?
- How to get a baby goat to bottle feed?
- How much milk to feed a baby goat?
- How long to bottle feed a baby goat?
What Kind of Milk to Feed Baby Goats:
When bottle-feeding baby goats, the very first milk they must receive is colostrum. Ideally, the dam will be producing enough colostrum that you can express her own into a bottle and immediately feed it to the kids. But if her fresh colostrum is not available for some reason, your other choices are to feed fresh colostrum from another doe that has kidded at the same time, feed frozen colostrum that you saved from a previous kidding, or feed kid colostrum replacer. For this last choice, it is important to be sure it’s kid colostrum replacer and not calf or lamb replacer as the nutrient needs are different for different species. It is also important to be sure it’s colostrum replacer and not milk replacer. Newborn kids absolutely must get colostrum in the first 24-48 hours of life or their chances of survival are low. Do not substitute any type of homemade replacer at this stage and don’t try to get by with regular whole milk.
Once you get the newborn kid through the first 24-48 hours, then you can switch to milk. Ideally, you will have fresh goat milk available as this is best. Many goat owners who choose to bottle-feed will milk the dam and then immediately transfer the milk to bottles and feed it to the babies. Other goat owners prefer to heat-treat the milk before bottle-feeding baby goats in order to eliminate the risk of potentially passing CAE or other diseases from the dam to the baby. I, myself, do my CAE tests while my does are pregnant so that I know they are negative and then I feed the mother’s milk to the babies raw, which feels more natural to me and I believe it contains more of the beneficial antibodies than heat-treated milk does. But if you do choose to heat-treat, remember that colostrum cannot actually be pasteurized because it will curdle, so it must just be gently heated to 135 degrees F and held at that temperature for one hour. Regular milk can be pasteurized at 161 degrees F for 30 seconds.
If you don’t have fresh goat milk for bottle-feeding baby goats, then your choices are goat milk replacer or another species of milk. I have seen goat milk replacer recipes but the advice I get from my veterinarian and goat mentors is that whole cow milk from the grocery store is more adequate and appropriate in the event that I don’t have, or don’t want to use, powdered replacers.
How to Get a Baby Goat to Take a Bottle:
If your newborn is healthy enough to have a strong sucking reflex, getting it to take a bottle will be relatively simple. I like to use the little red “Pritchard” nipples for newborns because they are smaller and easier for them to suck. Don’t forget to snip the tip of the nipple as it doesn’t come with a hole in it! Hold the bottle at an angle so that the milk is flowing downward, open the baby’s mouth with your fingers, and stick the nipple inside. I find it helpful to put gentle pressure on the top and bottom of the muzzle to help the baby hold the bottle in its mouth at first. A strong kid will generally be hungry and start sucking enthusiastically.
If the baby is too weak to suck, you may need to feed a few drops at a time through a medicine dropper (be careful not to put too much on its tongue or in the side of its cheek at once or it could go down the wrong tube and into the lungs). Or you may need to tube-feed the baby. I’ve also had babies that just needed to wake up a bit in order to get the sucking response going, and I find that using a supplement like “Nutri-Drench” or some Caro syrup or even coffee, rubbed on their gums, is often enough to give them a little energy boost and get them eating.
How Much to Feed a Baby Goat:
How much your babies will need depends on whether they are full-sized breeds or miniature breeds, and also on how old they are. In general, try to feed three to four ounces per five pounds of weight per feeding. At first, you may be feeding every three to four hours, and then after a few days, you’ll spread this out to four feedings a day. You can drop that back to two or three feedings a day at about three weeks of age, and then down to twice a day by six to eight weeks. For the last month, you can feed once a day as they should be eating some hay and grain by then, if not sooner.
Here are two useful charts to use as a starting point. You may need to modify the schedule and number of feedings per day based on your own schedule and time constraints, but this is a good place to begin:
Bottle-Feeding Nubian Goats (or other full-sized breeds):
Age | Ounces per Feeding | Frequency |
0-2 Days | 3-6 ounces | Every 3-4 hours |
3 Days to 3 Weeks | 6-10 ounces | Four times a day |
3 to 6 Weeks | 12-16 ounces | Three times a day |
6 to 10 weeks | 16 ounces | Twice a day |
10 to 12 weeks | 16 ounces | Once a day |
Bottle-Feeding Pygmy Goats (or other miniature breeds):
Age | Ounces per Feeding | Frequency |
0-2 Days | 2-4 ounces | Every 3-4 hours |
3 Days to 3 Weeks | 6-8 ounces | Four times a day |
3 to 8 Weeks | 12 ounces | Twice a day |
8-12 weeks | 12 ounces | Once a day |
How Long Do You Bottle-Feed a Baby Goat?
As a general rule of thumb, when I’ve decided on bottle-feeding baby goats, I try to feed doelings for at least three months and bucklings or wethers for at least two months. Sometimes I go longer if I have extra milk, but this seems to get them off to a good start and by two to three months they are eating grass, hay, and even some grain, so their need for milk is greatly reduced.
Bottle-feeding baby goats is a time commitment, but it’s also a fun way to bond with your babies and make them oh so friendly!
References
https://www.caprinesupply.com/raising-kids-on-pasteurized-milk
This is brilliant information,
It has helped me no adzackly the amount to feed my little mini buck. Thanku so so much.
What can we give baby goat other than milk or with milk ?
I have a ND girl whos baby girl is 5 days old and shes not verry good with bubby she dose let her feed but other than that she dosent realy want much to do with her. I also have a different dow whos baby boy is 3 weeks old and shes a grate mum. But when i let them all out together my dow with the boy picks on my 5 day old baby girl and her mum dosent seem to cear or help. So iam thinking it may be best to make the 5 day old a bottle baby how often should i feed her and how do i get her to take the bottle
Just kidded quads. So much different information. If we try to supplement do we need to remove the kids from the mom? Can we leave them with the family and feed in a pen next door?
Thank for the information I have two pygmy babies they are three days old and very sweet
This is a good article to go by.
I will pass it on yo my family and friends.
Thanks for all the information. I have two pygmy baby goats, a month old but I do not know how offer fresh hay and grain, the mommy died.
Hello, I have Nigerian drawf goats, my mama goat isn’t the best mom. She also has a problem with her utters get plugged. She is usually kicking the babies off her. They suckle only a few seconds it seems and quit. She just had triplets 2 days ago. Look look healthy, I was thinking about feeding them from a bottle as a supplement to make sure they are getting enough milk. I would really appreciate your opinion. Thank you
I have frozen goats milk from the previous year. Would this be safe to bottle feed kids if needed?
How do you get bottle babys to start drinking water when they are starting to wean off the bottle?
I have been bottle feeding my 2 mini silkies for 2 weeks now, do they have to have it heated up now?
I’m having problems calculating the amount of milk replacement to use for 4 and 6 oz of water. Can anyone help?
If you don’t have a doe to milk, it will be easier just to skip the replacer and move them to whole cows milk from the store. Baby goats will do just fine on it and in fact will thrive and then you won’t have to worry about whether the replacer is mixed correctly.