Energy requirements for maintenance and growth of young pre-ruminant Angora goats

There is little information available on the nutrient requirements of suckling Angora kids weighing less than 10 kg which has resulted in nutrition recommendations being based on older, heavier and weaned goats. This experiment determined the energy intake of suckling Angora kids to estimate maintenance ME requirement (MEm) and ME required for growth (MEg) for 8 and 21 day old kids. Does were housed in individual pens in an outdoor feedlot from day 47 of pregnancy. Pregnant does experienced a range of controlled nutrition treatments providing a range in live weight and body condition at kidding. From 4 days postpartum treatments were: ad libitum (AL) to allow maximum ME intake resulting in doe live weight gain; or Restricted (R) to 70% of AL, resulting in doe live weight loss until week 10 of lactation. Doe milk production was determined at days 8 and 21 of lactation, and ME intake of milk, kid liveweight change and fibre growth rate were determined. ME intake (kJ/kg0.75day) was then related to daily liveweight gain (g/kg0.75day) using multiple linear regression analysis. At 8 days of age, MEm = 1199 kJ/kg0.75day and MEg = 35.6 kJ/kg0.75day (P = 0.002). At 21 days of age, MEm = 700 kJ/kg0.75day (NS) and MEg = 24.0 kJ/kg0.75day (P < 0.01). Adjusting liveweight gain for fibre growth, adding separate terms for fibre growth, kid sex or other factors were not significant. Energy retained in mohair represented 0.4−0.7% of ME intake. The higher MEm determined in the present work compared with current recommendations accord with the expected direction of the results based on analyses using sheep, being that younger and less mature animals will have a higher energy requirement compared with older and more mature animals. Further contributing factors to the higher MEm values in the present work were that the kids were exposed to the effects of natural daily weather conditions and a greater activity increment.