I was out with a friend the other day to see the horses they had newly acquired.
They were really excited to show me the whole new setup they’d put together for their horses, which they’d never owned before but always dreamed of doing.
He knew I was a big fan of farm animals in general, as I’ve had goats all my adult life.
When we got to the feeding area, he mentioned that he’d ended up with a lot more bags of feed than he needed, and asked if there was anything I could use them for.
I said I was always looking for new things to feed my goats to keep their diets balanced and interesting, but I wasn’t sure whether horse feed would be good for goats.
So, I decided to look into it.
So, can goats eat horse feed?
That said, there’s not really much advantage to feeding horse feed to your goats.
There will no doubt be some nutrition in there which is beneficial to your goats, but it would be better off getting this elsewhere.
So, let’s look at what a goat’s diet should consist of first.
What should goats eat?
Goats are ruminants and browsers, meaning despite their reputation for being able to eat anything, they really do need quite a particular diet.
Firstly, most of what they eat should be dry hay.
This will account for around three quarters of their diet, and depending on breed and weight, each goat should eat between 2-4 pounds of hay a day.
They need a mostly fibrous diet, and hay is almost entirely fiber.
There are different kinds of hay you might want to use, again depending on the breed of your goat.
Some types, like legume hay, have much higher protein content.
Aside from the hay, your goats should ideally have a reasonably large pasture they can roam to browse for food.
This is what we mean when we say goats are browsers, as opposed to grazers (like sheep or cows).
They like to look around on their own and find food, like leaves, roots and even twigs.
This provides essential nutrition but also exercise and enrichment.
These two things will take up the majority of their day-to-day diet.
Then you will also want to feed them a variety of treats.
Fresh fruit and vegetables are a great option, and will go down very well. S
ome fruits, such as avocado, should be avoided and any fresh food should represent only a small part of their diet.
This is likely to be where you fit horse feed in, if there happens to be something in the horse feed that your goats particularly like. If they do, you should be very careful of moderation.
Horses are much larger animals than goats, and horse feed will contain much higher quantities of protein than they really need.
Is horse feed bad for goats?
The simple thing to remember is that anything (with the possible exception of hay) is going to be bad for your goats if they eat too much of it.
Horse feed usually consists of a lot of oats, barley, corn, wheat or even rice.
None of this should really be a large part of a goat’s diet.
In the right quantities, the right type of horse feed could be very good for your goats.
These ingredients are high in starch and carbohydrates, which are essential for a healthy goat.
However, your goat will already be getting most of what it needs from its hay.
Goats don’t usually adapt as easily to the kind of high concentrate diets that cattle, sheep and horses are more likely to get, and they can even lead to acidosis and urinary calculi, which can be very uncomfortable for your goat.
This is in extreme cases, but you should be aware of it.
It’s essential that you don’t overfeed your goats.
So, you should obviously be aware of the exact ingredients of the horse feed you have.
Very high concentrate feeds will not be the best option for your goats, even if they seem to like it a lot.
The fact is, goats are not feed-efficient, which means they need to eat a great deal of the foods that keep them healthy.
This is fine for hay, and why their diet is made up mostly of hay.
Virtually anything else, though, in too high quantities can cause problems.
Can horse feed kill goats?
Your goats, generally speaking, are very hardy animals.
Not everything is good for them, but it takes quite a lot of anything bad for them before serious adverse effects begin to appear.
Therefore, the likelihood of killing your goats with horse feed is very low.
However, horse feed does come in a great deal of different types.
This amount of variation can’t really be accounted for in a single answer.
In general, what’s safe for horses will be safe for goats in small quantities, but some kinds are likely to contain ingredients that your goat won’t like.
Goats and horse can share hay without any danger, and if you have both animals on your homestead, this is probably the best way to share their food.
Both animals will still need other things in their diet, but this will streamline things somewhat.
So, if you want a simple answer, you can, but you shouldn’t really feed your goats horse feed.
There may be something in it that they like, but they can get all the same benefits from foods elsewhere.
Just let your horses and goats share hay, and cater to their specific needs in the rest of their diet.