Rearing Kids. 177 



the first fortnight or so, and three afterwards. In six 

 weeks they will be eating hay and grass, and may also 

 have oats to nibble; but the artificial feeding should con- 

 tinue as long as they are willing to take it. 



By being accustomed to sloppy food in this manner 

 for some time after weaning they will take it ever after- 

 wards, and when they become mature goats and have kids 

 themselves such feeding has a great effect on the pro- 

 duction of milk. Besides this, plenty of liquid food 

 encourages a big stomach, which, with a good digestion, 

 is a marked feature in abundant milkers. 



Treatment of K,ids after l&Jeantng. 



The treatment of kids after they are weaned must 

 depend on the purpose they are intended to serve. Those 

 for future stock need plenty of exercise and good feeding, 

 as great a variety of food being given them as possible. 

 The fact that some goats readily devour anything, whilst 

 others are fastidious and care only for corn and hay or 

 grass, refusing even some kinds of the former, is doubt- 

 less to be accounted for to a great extent by the way 

 they have been brought up. For a goat to be a good 

 milker it should be a great eater and drinker, and should 

 be so constituted by nature that the food it consumes is 

 transformed into milk rather than into meat or fat ; hence 

 it is that heavy milkers are usually thin although well 

 fed. A goat, however, is like a human being, inasmuch 

 as it becomes satiated after a time with one kind of food, 

 but will continue to eat with avidity when something 

 fresh is offered to it. Thus it is important that young 

 growing goats should be early accustomed to such things 

 as bran-mashes, grains, pulped roots, linseed cake, &c. 



For the first six months or thereabouts kids should be 

 fed four times daily; oats, crushed or whole, and bran 

 (which is specially good to make bone and muscle) should 



