Whole Goat Care

While we were at our county fair a couple of weeks ago, found out that a 4H goat family I know is a distributor(dealer?) for Chaffhaye.............she just so happened to have some with her , as she was feeding it to her Nigis, and we talked about it, and I begged a couple of handfuls to see if Sam's goaties would like it. The babies were pretty leery of it, and mostly just sniffed it, but the milkers gobbled it up & begged for more!! It has a lot of things going for it, but I'd love others' opinions...................thought someone on here (Yvonne, maybe?) had tried it, and............or wanted to try it, but nobody around her sold it, or.....................??????????????????????? Input, s'il vous plait!

I have looked for it here because I read so much good about it. The best I could get was sending a bale through a mulcher and mixing it with the molasses myself, but then came the problem of finding a mulcher/limb chopper that was not going to cost an arm and a leg.

I do know it is more cost effective to feed this than baled hay...less waste.

I remember Yvonne talking about it a while back

Yes we have fed it and still feed it to the milkers,especially since hay is so hard to come by and alfafa costs an arm and a leg. I also prefer it over the pellets, because goats need long fiber that pellets do not provide. We are actually now feeding the Southern States brand called simply Alfafa Forage. I have found that the chaffhaye would contain (they said it was harmless) a white mold on the outer side along the bag. We haven't had that problem with the Southern States brand.
All of my goats will gobble it down, but due to the high cost of it (between 15.00 and 18.00 dollars a bag) only the milkers get it.

We fed a Purina brand to our milkers one winter. The girls liked it.

I am glad you brought this us Doreen. We(Jim & I) have been discussing how and what we are going to feed out this winter and Chaffe was one of the ideas. With the price of all feed stuff we have been considering cutting back more on the amount of feed and just loading up on grass hay, alfalfa, alfalfa pellets and chaffe hay. Alfalfa pellets are the cheapest product in our area on our feed list, believe it or not.

We have to be a bit more selective on the hays we feed out with the Angoras. Any hay with briars, thorns, stick tights, etc. get caught up in their fleece and can mat which can destroy their fleece.

Kendra, I wish you were closer, we have a chipper/shredder that is setting here unused.

Jama, maybe you could use it to chop your hay for the angoras!! If you have a feed mill they can sell you the dry or liquid molasses to mix in, and to do that an old cement mixer works great. It will cut down on waste and stop the getting caught in the hair.

Hey Jama, how much is the alfalfa pellets there? They have went up in price at our feed store.

They have went up here too, still the cheapest thing though. We pay $6.80 per 50 lb. bag,

( cough, choke ) Is that all?? Here we pay at least twice that for a 50-lb. bag!!!! But the price I got from the Chaffhaye dealer here was 12.75, which is better than Yvonne's $15 - $18 a bag. Interesting how much the prices vary in different parts of the U.S.

Yup and alfafa pellets here are at 13.00 a bag as well...Beet pulp is up to 13.75 a bag, when you can find it....Whole oats 12.50 a bag...Medicated goat feed, 11.16 as of today. Everything has gone up at least 2.00 a bag in less than year..

Not trying to hijack but... four years ago I was paying 6.95 for Country Acres medicated goat feed and now I'm paying 9.95. It only started to increase two years ago so that's how fast it's jumped.

Looking at your prices, we are lucky, our goat ration is $7.43 per 50 this week. Oats are $8.20.
Yep, I can go back in our receipts and see where things have jumped at various rates over the years too. It all keeps going up.
Our prices also fluctuates with the price of grain. On 8/14 when I picked up feed, our goat ration was $8.83 per 50 lb. On Friday 8/29 it was $7.43 per 50.

Yesterday when I brought feed, Damon, the guy at Southern States said "feed has gone down a little bit this week" I am still staring at my reciept trying to figure out what went down and I swear I don't see where it did. And there is still no beet pulp in this area, everybody is telling me that there is a shortage of it and it will be a couple of weeks before there will be any available.

Anytime you ever need something really bad just let me know and I'll keep an eye out for it too. We go to KY pretty much and sometimes I can find things in Abingdon that I can't find any place else.

Yep, it sure is making things hard on everyone because as far as I have seen the price of goats hasn't gone up, we have got about the same prices for meat wethers as we always have and if anything, I think breeding stock prices have went down some. JMO

Well, having trouble getting in touch with the Chaffhaye dealer, so Yvonne, since you said Southern States down there had it, I checked at ours, and yes!! - sold under Triple Crown Alfalfa Forage - is that what you've been getting??. Looks about the same as the Chaffhaye, although I think the % of protein in that is 8%, and the Triple Crwon looks to be 15%. Like you said, it was much higher ($16-something), so I see your point about just giving it to your milkers!!!! How much of it are you feeding your girls, and are you deciding the amount by their weight, or the same amount across the board???

We feed it to the milkers before they come into the milking parlor and after they have had their grain, so they get it as a group...that is unless they are really milking and need weight, those does get extra on the stand as well. So for the entire group of milkers (about 17 does, both big and small) they get a 5 gallon bucket packed full. Sometimes they eat all of it, sometimes they don't. It is much drier than Chaffhaye and it doesn't have that wine smell to it. I actually have some does that will not eat chaffhaye, but will eat the SS forage.

Yes, it is drier than the Chaffhaye, and seems like it takes them a long time to chew it...............it's almost comical to watch.

You give a 5-gal. bucket stuffed full of it to 17 does, all there at the same time?? Don't they fight & try to kill each other for it?????

Nope not any more than they do when they get their grain. They are also on free choice hay so they are eating 24 hours a day.