Can Goats Eat Sorghum? (Is Sorghum Safe For Goats?)


Yes, goats can eat sorghum, and in many ways it’s incredibly beneficial! In many goat farms, sorghum and sorghum grain are the main feed of a goat and provide the backbone of their diet. If it’s more widely available in your area than other feeds, it’s a great choice.

 

So, yes, there is no doubt that goats can eat sorghum.

It’s non-toxic, completely safe, and indeed very healthy and nutritious for them.

How much you feed them is, really, down to you, but there are quite a few advantages to other types of main feed that sorghum does lack—although they are mostly about your pocket, rather than your goat’s welfare.

Let’s look into this.

Can Goats Eat Sorghum?

 

Is sorghum good for goats?

Yes, in many ways!

The great thing about sorghum is that it is extremely hardy.

Much of the time, when we talk about sorghum feed, we are referring to dried, grain sorghum—but most of what I am saying applies to both this and the fresh plant.

The plant is very drought-hardy, providing year-round good forage for your goats, depending on where you live.

It is a great thing to plant where your goats can feed on it, as they will almost never be able to get rid of it and it will keep coming back.

Sorghum is a great source of fiber, which is essential to your goat’s overall diet.

Fiber helps digestion move more smoothly, and so helps the overall function of your goat’s diet.

They can never have too much fiber!

Sorghum is also a good source of many vitamins and antioxidants.

Antioxidants are essential to preventing the formation of free radicals, which damage your goat’s cells.

So, yes, sorghum is a great choice for your goats, and can even make great hay for the winter.

It’s a really versatile plant!

But, are there any caveats?

 

Is sorghum bad for goats?

Sorghum is not bad for goats.

It’s perfectly safe, and non-toxic.

It will not harm them, and indeed moderation isn’t even an especially important point here.

Of course, you should always be careful of how much your goats eat, but as I said, sorghum can essentially make up the fibrous plant matter backbone of your goat’s diet.

The disadvantages of sorghum will not be for your goat but for you.

Depending on where you live, sorghum may well be far more expensive and far less widely available than other, more conventional hays and pellet feeds.

Sorghum is great, but it is not exactly better than other more common hays and feeds.

If you can get it easily, then that’s great, but you should always consider other options.

Sorghum is not widely available anywhere.

Furthermore, while they have been a favorite choice on large scale farms, you can finesse your goat’s diet a little bit more than this since you only have a few.

Maybe feed them sorghum some months, and pellets another.

But, in any case, sorghum is not bad for your goats.

 

Can goats eat grain sorghum?

Yes, they certainly can, and grain sorghum has been a favorite of many goat farms throughout the world.

Grain sorghum is a fantastic, concentrated source of protein for your goats, as I said providing the backbone of their diets.

In a sorghum grain diet, I would still recommend getting them plenty of hay elsewhere.

They need the added fiber, ideally, and grain sorghum, while fibrous, isn’t anywhere near as good as hay.

So, yes, grain sorghum is a great choice.

 

Can goats eat sorghum plants?

Yes, they can also eat the sorghum plants themselves.

If you have wild, or even planted, sorghum growing on your goat’s pasture, then this is a fantastic bit of forage for them.

It’s perfect: fibrous, flowered, nutritious and tasty.

What you can even do is harvest some of the sorghum to let it dry out as hay.

Sorghum is a great source of hay in its own right, although your goats will also love the fresh plant.

There is no bad way for them to eat sorghum.

 

Can goats eat sorghum flowers?

Yes, they certainly can. the flowers will most likely get vacuumed up by your goat without even realizing as it eats the rest of the plant.

The flowers are often what attracts goats to certain plants, though.

So, yes, goats can eat sorghum flowers.

 

Whatever form the sorghum takes, then, it comes with many great benefits for your goats.

It is healthy, nutritious, and provides the right number of calories that it can be their main feed.

Indeed, many farms do opt for sorghum as a main feed due to a variety of both health and financial advantages.

In any case, feeding sorghum to your goats, even in small amounts, will have fantastic effects on their health that you will notice for years to come.

 

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