Bottle Feeding Goats: Frequently Asked Questions

In the last 20 years, we have successfully raised more bottle babies than we can count. Bottle babies can sometimes be tricky, so it helps to know not only the basics, but warning signs to look out for that might tell you something is amiss with the health of your goat. Here are some answers to frequently asked questions about bottle feeding that we hope is a helpful starting point for you and your baby goats.

What causes a baby goat to be bottle fed?

There are several reasons to start bottle feeding goats. This can include:

• The mother dies, or gets sick and is unable to produce enough milk (or lactate).
• The mother develops a udder problem that makes it difficult or impossible to lactate. This can include mastitis, a serious infection of the goat’s mammary glad that decreases milk production.
• The mother gives birth to more goats than she can produce milk for, or she does not have enough teats available for all of her kids.

How long are baby goats bottle fed for?

We typically bottle feed our goats for 8 weeks, which is about how long they would nurse from their mother if they were not bottle fed. However, this is not a hard-and-fast rule. The most important thing is to watch the kid and see how well they are transitioning to solid feed. Some may need a little longer to fully adjust.

What materials do I need to bottle feed?

Milk. For this you can use actual goat milk (if you happen to also have a dairy goat) or milk replacer.

Bottles and nipples. Usually, when our bottle babies are just starting out, we use baby bottles and nipples. When they are older, we transition to using larger bottles (even clean, plastic bottles will do) and black nipples that you can order online or get from a farm store.

Cleaning supplies. Keeping your bottles and nipples clean is essential for the bottle-feeding process, and helps to ward off health issues in your goats. It helps to have a dedicated brush for cleaning, as well as antibacterial soap.

Probiotics. Adding this to your milk replacer helps keep your bottle babies strong and healthy. We usually use the brand Goats Prefer. Instructions for using these probiotics are usually included on the product’s label.

What milk replacer should I use?

We prefer to use a medicated milk replacer, which helps reduce the risk of a baby goat developing scours, or diarrhea, which is what most goats die of at bottle feeding age.

It is important to buy a milk replacer that is formulated just for goats. Although milk replacers for calves or other livestock are often times cheaper, they do not have the correct formulation of fat and protein that baby goats need for their development.

Avoid products like Unimilk, which claim to work for multiple species. In reality, a milk replacer that “works” for multiple species means that it does not have the correct nutritional formulation for any of those species, since they all have specific dietary needs.

How much milk replacer should I give, and how frequently?

How much milk replacer you feed your goats is dependent on their weight and age, and will differ slightly depending on the type of milk replacer you buy. Go by the instructions found on your milk replacer, which will tell you how to increase the amount of milk you give to your bottle babies as they grow.

In general, any changes made to the amount you give your babies should be done very gradually. This minimizes the risk of upsetting their gut and causing health problems.

As far a frequency goes, it is important to try and feed them, especially when they are in the first few weeks of life, about 3-4x a day. Making sure there are enough feeding times help to mimic the access to milk they would be getting if they were nursing from their mother. Again, recommendations for frequency should also be found on your milk replacer instructions.

How early can I start bottle feeding my goats?

Before anything else, all baby goats need to have colostrum first, which provides them with immunoglobulins that protect them from disease until their own immune systems have developed. This needs to happen within the first 12 hours after birth – wait much longer than this, and the immunoglobulins will not be absorbed and your baby goat will be susceptible to disease, and their chances of survival lowered significantly. If you have the chance, collect and freeze colostrum from one of your goats that has kidded. This gives you a source of colostrum if one of your other goats is unable to provide it to her kids sometime later down the line.

How do I get my baby goats started on bottle feeding?

It is incredibly important to start training your bottle babies to the bottle early. This also goes for kids that you suspect might need to be bottle babies if it seems the mothers might not be able to support all of her kids. If you wait much longer than four or five days after birth, it gets significantly harder to train the goat to the bottle. As a result, if you suspect one of your goat’s kids may need to be a bottle baby (but isn’t one yet), start supplementing their diet with bottle feeding as soon as possible to get them used to the bottle.

When introducing the bottle for the first time, we start with a baby bottle. Make sure to cut an “x” at the end of the nipple so there is a big enough opening for the milk to come through (I usually use nail scissors for this).

Hold the goat, and put the nipple in its mouth. If you’re lucky, they will have an automatic suckling reflex. If not, pull the nipple in and out a little, or squirt a little bit into the goat’s mouth so they understand what is going on.

Your goats may pick this up the first time they try, or it might take up to a week. If they are having difficulty and are unable to drink as much as they are supposed to, you may have to slightly alter their feeding schedule to work up to the desired amount as listed on your milk replacer for your goat’s age and weight.

What should I do if it refuses to take the bottle?

• Try putting a little bit of molasses either on the end of the nipple or in the goat’s mouth. This can help give the baby goat a small burst of energy that may help them latch on.

• If you rub around their tail area, this mimics the behavior of a mother goat, which might stimulate or invigorate nursing activity.

• Use a 12 cc syringe (with no needle) filled with milk replacer to squirt milk into their mouth. Sometimes that helps them understand what we are trying to do, and some start to suck on the syringe.

• If you have tried everything and your baby goat’s health is deteriorating because it is not receiving enough food, you may have to tube feed your baby goat. This usually involves putting a feeding tube down its throat and into its stomach to feed it. This will keep your goat alive, but it is not something that can be done for long.

What common bottle feeding mistakes should I avoid?

• Not providing enough for the correct nutrition. This can happen if you do not measure and mix your milk replacer consistently. Malnutrition can leave your baby goats weak and susceptible to infection.

• Bottle feeding is a lot of work, and cannot be done just once or twice a day. Feed consistently and in the amount/ frequency that is specified by the milk replacer. Ensure that you bottle feed them for the full duration they need to be bottle fed – you cannot quit after one month.

• Unclean equipment. Make sure to wash all of your supplies with hot water and soap after every feeding. This helps reduce the risk of introducing bacteria to your goats that may cause scours.

• Milk is not heated to a consistent temperature. Whatever temperature you feed your goats at, your goat’s gut flora will adapt to that temperature. As a result, its gut will be very sensitive to temperature changes in milk, so keep it within a similar temperature range. The temperature should be pleasantly warm (not scalding, but not cold).

What are the warning signs to look out for?

Changes in behavior and lethargy. It is important to watch your goat enough to understand what its normal behavior looks like so that you can easily spot when it is acting abnormally. Goats are prey animals, and are thus very good at hiding the symptoms of illness and sickness, making potential problems hard to spot if you are unfamiliar with your goat’s regular behavior. A change in behavior may indicate stomach upset, that it was fed at a different temperature than it was used to, or that the mix or amount is wrong.

Coughing and wheezing. This may be a sign that your baby goat has developed pneumonia.

Diarrhea (or scours). May be a sign of coccidiosis, and may occur if your baby goat was exposed to bacteria, either from an unsanitary environment, unclean bottles or nipples, or another source.

Lack of appetite/ suddenly refuses to take the bottle. A goat that previously was fine on the bottle but now refuses food may have stomach upset, or may be being fed too much.