1. Distribution - The goat is one
of the smallest domesticated ruminants which has served
mankind earlier and longer than cattle and sheep.
It is managed for the production of milk, meat and
wool, particularly in arid, semitropical or mountainous
countries. In temperate zones, goats are kept often
rather as supplementary animals by small holders,
while commercially cows or buffaloes are kept for
milk, cheese and meat, and sheep for wool and meat
production. Nonetheless, there are more than 460 million
goats worldwide presently producing more than 4.5
million tons of milk and 1.2 million tons of meat
besides mohair, cashmere, leather and dung; and more
people consume milk and milk products from goats worldwide
than from any other animal. Cheese production, e.g.,
from goat milk even in France, Greece, Norway and
Italy is of economic importance. Goat herds, on the
other hand low producing though, are an expression
of capital assets and wealth in Africa and Asia where
they are found in large numbers. In the United States,
there are between 2 and 4 million head; with Texas
leading in Angora, meat and bush goats; and California
leading in dairy goats.
2. Goats can survive on bushes, trees,
desert scrub and aromatic herbs when sheep and cattle
would starve to death. Goat herders often have neglected
a rational numerical balance between goat numbers
and sparse vegetation. Over-grazing has destroyed
many tree and woodland areas which was blamed then
on goats rather than man, and this has caused widespread
ecological and political concerns, erosion, desertification
and even ban on freely grazing goats in some areas.
On the other hand, goats are valued by cattle and
sheepmen in the fight against brush encroachment on
millions of acres of open rangeland.
3. Swiss goat breeds are the world's
leaders in milk production. Indian and Nubian derived
goat breeds are dual-purpose meat and milk producers.
Spanish and South African goats are best known for
meat producing ability. The Turkish Angora, Asian
Cashmere and the Russian Don goats are kept for mohair
and cashmere wool production. In addition, there are
Pygmy goats from Western Africa of increasing interest
as laboratory and pet animals.
4. Goat milk casein and goat milk
fat are more easily digested than from cow milk. Goat
milk is valued for the elderly, sick, babies, children
with cow milk allergies, patients with ulcers, and
even preferred for raising orphan foals or puppies.
Fat globules in goat milk are smaller than in cow
milk and remain dispersed longer. Goat milk is higher
in vitamin A, niacin, choline and inositol than cow
milk, but it is lower in vitamin B6, B12, C and carotenoids.
The shorter chain fatty acids (C6, C8, C10, C12) are
characteristically higher in goat milk than in cow
milk. Otherwise milk gross composition from goats
or cows is similar except for differences due to breeds,
climate, stage of lactation and feeds.
5. Breeds of goats vary from as little
as 20 lb mature female bodyweight and 18 inches female
withers for dwarf goats for meat production up to
250 lb and 42 inches withers height for Indian Jamnapari,
Swiss Saanen, Alpine and AngloNubian for milk production.
Some Jamnapari males may be as tall as 50 inches at
withers. Angora goats weigh between 70 to 110 lb for
mature females and are approximately 25 inches tall.
Birthweights of female singles are between 3 and 9
lb; twins being often a pound lighter and males 1/2
lb heavier. Twinning is normal in goats with a high
percentage of triplets thus giving several breeds
an average annual litter size above 2 per doe and
more than 200reproduction rate. Females are called
doe, young are kids, males are bucks; one speaks of
buck and doe kids, and doelings, and of wethers or
castrates.
6. Differentiation Morphologically,
goats may have horns of the scimitar or corkscrew
types, but many are dehorned in early age with a heated
iron, caustic or later on with a rubber band or surgical
saw. Goats may also be hornless genetically. They
can be short haired, long haired, have curled hair,
are silky or coarse wooled. They may have wattles
on the neck and beards. Some breeds, particularly
the European, have straight noses, others have convex
noses, e.g., the Jamnapari and Nubian breeds or slightly
dished noses (Swiss). Swiss and other European breeds
have erect ears, while pendulous, drooping, large
ears characterize Indian and Nubian goats. The American
LaMancha breed has no external ear. A ''gopher'' ear
rudiment in LaMancha is less than 1 inch long with
little or no cartilage; an ''elf'' ear is less than
2 inches long, but bucks can be registered only with
gopher ears. The responsible gene for rudimentary
ears is dominant, thus sires with gopher ears will
always have gopher or elf-eared offspring, no matter
what the genotype of the dam is to which he was mated.
7. Goats come in almost any color,
solid black, white, red, brown, spotted, two and three
colored, blended shades, distinct facial stripes,
black and white saddles, depending on breeds.
8. Teeth in goats are a good guide
to age. Six lower incisors are found at birth and
a set of 20 ''milk teeth'' are complete at 4 weeks
of age consisting of the eight incisors in the front
of the lower jaw, and 12 molars, three on each side
in each jaw. Instead of incisors in the upper jaw
there is a hard dental pad against which the lower
incisors bite and cut. Some goats have an undesirable
inherited recessive condition of ''parrot'' (overshot
upper jaw) or ''carp'' mouth (undershot upper jaw)
which does not interfere with barn feeding conditions
but handicaps the goat severely in pasturing and browsing,
because the lower incisor teeth cannot cut correctly
against the upper dental pad. With progressing age,
the permanent teeth wear down from the rectangular
crossectional shape and cores to the round stem which
is a further distinguishing mark of age. Furthermore,
there are pregnancy rings marking horns and telling
age.
9. The digestive tract of the goat
after nursing has the typical four stomach compartments
of ruminants consisting of the rumen (paunch) (4-6
gallon), the reticulum (honeycomb) (1-2 liters), the
omasum maniply) (1 liter), and the abomasum (true
stomach) (3.5 liters). The intestinal canal is about
100 feet long (11 liters), or 25 times the length
of a goat. The total blood volume of the goat approximates
1/12-1/13 of bodyweight; it takes about 14 seconds
for goat blood to complete one circulation.
10. Among diseases, goats are not
too different from cattle and sheep in the same regions.
Goats tend to have more internal parasites than dairy
cows, especially in confined management. They tend
to have less tuberculosis, milk fever, post partum
ketosis and brucellosis than dairy cows and their
milk tends to be of lower bacteria counts than cow
milk. They have more prepartum pregnancy toxemia than
dairy cows, and are known to have laminitis, infectious
arthritis, Johne's disease, listeriosis, pneumonia,
coccidiosis, scours, scabies, pediculosis, liver fluke
disease and mastitis.
11. Reproduction - The skin of the
goat has sebaceous and sweat glands besides growing
the hair cover, horns, hooves and the two compartmented
mammary gland (udder). Before the first pregnancy,
the udder is underdeveloped, but with sustained repeated
gentle massaging, a small, normal milk producing gland
can be stimulated in virgin does and even in goat
bucks. In contrast to sheep, the teats of goat's udders
are conveniently long and large for hand milking.
12. Tails, scent and horns distinguish
goats easily from sheep and cattle. The goat tail
is short, bare underneath and usually carried upright.
Major scent glands are located around the horn base.
They function in stimulating estrus in male and female
goats, improving conception. The goat odor is, however,
a detriment to goat keeping and milk consumption if
not properly controlled. Many goat breeds are seasonal
breeders, being influenced by the length of daylight.
Artificial insemination is commercially practiced
in regions where numbers of females make it economical.
Goats are in puberty at 1/2 year of age and can be
bred if of sufficient size. Does come into estrus
in 21 day cycles normally, lasting approximately 1
to 2 days.
13. In temperate zones, goats breed
normally from August through February. Nearer the
equator, goats come into estrus throughout the year.
Thus more than one litter per year is possible, considering
the length of pregnancy of 150 days. Five days after
ovulation one or several corpus luteum form to protect
the concept us from abortion. The goat pregnancy is
corpus luteum dependant in contrast to cattle. If
no conception occurred, the corpus luteum disappears
and new ovulation takes place. A buck ejaculates normally
3/4 - 1 1/2 ml of semen with 2-3 billion spermatozoa
each. The life of an ovum after ovulation is about
8-10 hours. As the ovum travels down the goat's oviduct,
it is fertilized by semen which traveled up through
the uterus. The fertilized embryo becomes firmly attached
to the uterine walls and surrounds itself with a nourishing
placenta starting at 52 days after conception. Semen
of goat bucks freezes as well as that of bulls and
may be stored for years in 1 ml ampules or 1/2 ml
straws in liquid nitrogen tanks for artificial insemination
use.
14. Origin - Wild goats or escaped
feral goats are found in many countries and islands
and can be harmful to the vegetation if numbers are
left uncontrolled.
15. Truly wild goats are found on
Creta, other Greek islands, in Turkey, Iran, Turkmenia,
Pakistan; in the Alps, Siberia, Sudan, Caucasus; the
Pyrenees, the Himalayan, Central Asian, Russian and
Tibetan mountain ranges, and prefer rocky, precipitous
mountains and cliffs. Goats can not be herded as well
with dogs as sheep; instead they tend to disperse
or face strangers and dogs headon. Relatives of true
goats are the Rocky Mountain goat, the chamois of
the Alps and Carpathian, and the muskox.
16. Goats belong, scientifically, to the Bovidae family
within the suborder of ruminants (chevrotain, deer,
elk, caribou, moose, giraffe, okapi, antelope), who
besides the other suborders of camels, swine and hippopotamuses
make up the order of eventoed hoofed animals called
artiodactyla. They have evolved 20 million years ago
in the Miocene Age, much later than horses, donkeys,
zebras, tapirs, rhinoceroses, who make up the order
of uneventoed hoofed animals; and the hyrax, elephants,
manatees who make up the ancient near-hoofed animals.
All these are herbivorous mammals, i.e., they live
from plants and nurse their young with milk from an
external gland after the young is born, having been
carried in pregnancy to term relatively long in an
internal uterus with a complex, nourishing placenta.
17. Goats and sheep make up a tribe
within the Bovidae family called Caprini that include
six goat, six sheep and five related species. Goats
have a 2n chromosome set number of 60 while domestic
sheep have a 2n set of 54; yet living hybrids of the
two genera have been reported. The six species of
goats can be distinguished by their horn shapes:
1. Capra aegagrus, the wild (or bezoar) goat of Near
East Asia has scimitar-shaped horns with a sharp anterior
keel and a few knobs in- terrupting it.
2. Capra ibex, the ibex of the Alps, Siberia and Nubia
has scimitar shaped horns with a flatter front and
many transverse ridges.
3. Capra falconeri, the markhor of Central Asia has
sharpkeeled horns that are twisted into open or tight
spirals.
4. Capra pyrenaica, the Spanish goat has outward-upward
curving horns with a sharp posterior keel.
5. Capra cylindricornis, the Dagestan tur of the Caucasus
mountains has round outward-back inward curving horns.
6. Capra hircus, the domestic goat evolved principally
from capra aegagrus, except for Angora, Cashmere goats,
and Damascus types who descended from capra falconeri.
18. Breeds
Domestic goat breeds are many. Swiss breeds are distinguished
in milk producing ability and have influenced significantly
milk production from goats around the world, especially
in Europe, North America, Australia and New Zealand.
A few breeds kept mostly for meat are the South African
boer goat, the Indian beetal, black Bengal, the Latin
American criollo, the US ''Spanish'' goats and most
of the small or nondescript goats. Fiber producing
goat breeds are the Angora in Turkey, USA, South Africa;
the Cashmere in Afghanistan, Iran, Australia and China;
and Don breed in Russia.
19. The major breeds of US goats
are:
20. Saanen originate from Switzerland
(Saanen Valley), are totally white, with or without
horns. The white color is dominant over other colors.
They are mostly short haired. The ''Appenzell'' is
a similar breed, but partially related to the Toggenburg
is from Northern Switzerland, longhaired, white and
hornless. Saanen have been exported around the world
as leading milk producers. An Australian Saanen doe
holds the world record milk production of 7,714 lbs
in 365 days. Saanen have been bred in Switzerland
for odorfree milk long ago.
21. Toggenburg, brown with white
facial, ear and leg stripes, another straight nosed,
horned or hornless, mostly shorthaired, erect eared
goat, as all Swiss are, has been very popular in the
USA, comes from N.E. Switzerland, but is 4 inches
shorter in height and 18 lb lighter in average than
the Saanen. They have been bred pure for over 300
years, longer than many of our other domestic breeds
of livestock. They are reliable milk producers summer
and winter, in temperate and tropical zones. Mrs.
Carl Sandburg, wife of the famous US poet had several
world record Toggenburg does on official USDA tests.
22. Alpine (including French, Rock
and British), another Swiss breed (French Switzerland),
horned or hornless, shorthaired, as tall and strong
as the Saanen, with usually faded shades of white
into black, with white facial stripes on black. They
are second in milk production to Saanen and Toggenburg.
23. LaMancha is a new, young breed
developed in California from Spanish Murciana origin
and Swiss and Nubian crossings. They are known for
excellent adaptability and good winter production.
They are also producing fleshier kids than the Swiss,
but are not milking as much. They have straight noses,
short hair, hornless or horns, and no external ear
due to a dominant gene. They are more the size of
Toggenburg. Their milk fat content is higher than
that of the Swiss breeds.
24. (Anglo)-Nubian is a breed developed
in England from native goats and crossed with Indian
and Nubian which have heavy arched ''Roman'' noses
and long, drooping, pendulous ears, spiral horns and
are shorthaired. They are leggy and as tall as Saanen,
but produce less milk, though higher milk fat levels
and are more fleshy. They are less tolerant of cold
but do well in hot climates. They ''talk'' a lot,
and are in numbers the most popular breed in USA and
Canada. They have a tendency for triplets and quadruplets.
They are horned or hornless and have many colors that
may be ''Appaloosa''-like spotted.
25. Oberhasli, a western Swiss breed,
usually solid red or black, horned or hornless, erect
ears, not as tall as Saanen, very well adapted for
high altitude mountain grazing and long hours of marching;
popular in Switzerland, but milk production is variable.
They are also called Swiss Alpine, Chamoisie or Brienz.
26. Angora originated in the Near
East. The long upper coat (mohair) is the valuable
product in the Angora in contrast to the Cashmere,
where the fine underwool is the valuable product.
Head has a straight or concave nose, thin, not very
long; pendulous ears and twisted horns, in both sexes.
It is a small breed, usually white. The haircoat is
long with undulating locks and ringlets of fine, silky
hair. The top quality fleece of purebreds may be 1-2
lbs, but slightly more in males and wethers. They
are bearded. Spring moult is natural and shearing
occurs just before. They are not very prolific and
twinning is less frequent than in other breeds.
27. Pygmy are dwarf, short legged
goats from West and Central Africa and the Caribbean.
Their growth rates and milk production are relatively
respectable, although low, twinning is frequent and
they are breeding all year usually. They are adaptable
to humid tropics and resistant to trypanosoma.
28. Others. There is little known
about the so-called Spanish or bush goats that are
kept on the open range in the Southwest mostly. Also,
a few minor breeds exist in this country, e.g. the
Sables, which are a colored variety of the Saanen.
It would be profitable to know more about the other
at least 60 goat breeds in the world and their comparative
values under US conditions.
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