Sometimes nature beat the well of us and impede our power to stock up on hay to feed our livestock during the wintertime . Whether it be a very wet season or a drouth that limits your hay harvest , it ’s a sound musical theme to have a backup plan for wintertime animal feed .
Hayis a backup forforagerooted in a pasturage . young animate being have high nutrient demand relative to total aspiration , so the highest - quality hay available should be fed to them . Mature sheep and goats can sustain weight on hay that is 7 to 9 percent raw protein and 52 to 55 percent total digestible nutrients . Depending your animals ’ geezerhood and your normal hay case , you may be able to substitute corn whisky stalking Basle .
The corn stalk will likely be deficient in protein and energy . Sheep and Capricorn will not eat much ( if any ) of the large stalks . Sheepandgoats , by nature , favor green over dead and leaf over stem . nutrient in the plant are concentrated in fleeceable leaf , and the leaves are generally more toothsome and digestible than the stems .
If you are downcast on hay , try looking for another reservoir of long - stem fiber . Hayavailability differs according to neighborhood of the res publica . Timothy hay is pop in the east and a grass hay is good for little ruminants . In the southward , Bermuda dope hays are popular . If put up correctly ( harvested with less than 20 days of growth ) , the Bermuda Arthur Garfield Hays can be a good root of fiber for lowly ruminant . goober pea and soybean hays can be very near hays for little ruminant . Vetches or pea William Harrison Hays , if usable in your domain , are legumes high in crude protein , too . Alfalfa is the gold standard . modest grain hays ( wheat , oat ) can be good if harvested before the plant begins to make a seedhead . Wheat or oat wheat ( after the grain is harvested ) pee-pee very hapless calibre hay for little ruminant , and the awns can hurt the animate being ’s oral cavity .
If there is a room to mash the bales and add some energy ( corn whiskey ) , protein ( soy or cottonseed meal ) , a mineral packet , and molasses to cut back the debris , you could make a decent feed . Many of the bigger feed companies have unadulterated goat feeds , but they might be too expensive for you . An alternative could be to feed the corn stalk bales and supplement with about 1 to 1½ hammering of alfalfa per head per Clarence Shepard Day Jr. .
— Frank Craddock , PhD , Extension Sheep and Goat Specialist , Texas A & M University , and Rick Machen , PhD , prof and Animal & Natural Resource Management Specialist , Texas A & M University , Texas AgriLife Extension Service
