Corn

[warthog]

I have been researching feeding corn to sheep. The person I bought my two sheep from had them out to pasture all day and fed them corn in the evening.

From my research, I am finding that it is said that corn is OK for sheep, but to feed whole corn not cracked corn and can be fed up to 1lb per day.

What I don't understand is everything says not to feed corn to goats, but if you do feed them a little feed them cracked corn.

Question. 1. Why is it OK to feed corn to sheep and not goats?

2. What would be the reason to feed whole corn to sheep and if you were to give goats corn, to feed cracked corn.


Any thoughts anyone.

 

[ksalvagno]

Probably the way their stomachs process it.

 

[Roll farms]

FWIW, our goats get roughly 1/5 of their 'winter' ration in corn...as it warms up, that goes down to roughly 1/10 of their ration....I add more corn as the temps go down in fall.

(Does only, the boys get a pelleted feed.)

The lady I bought my first Nubians from fed hers nothing but corn and hay, so when I brought them home, I fed them 50% corn and 50% sweet feed. No mineral, no supplements, just corn and cheap sweet feed.

I gradually started learning more about their needs, and feeding less corn, but I still give them some corn and they do fine.
One of my best milkers prefers corn and will 'cherry pick' it out of the feed pan on the milk stand.

I am not advocating it, just saying they won't drop dead if they get a little corn.

 

[aggieterpkatie]

There's no real difference in feeding corn to sheep vs. goats in the way they digest it. Corn is a high energy feed, and it's cheap. There's been some research about whether feeding whole corn vs. cracked corn is better. Whole corn must be chewed again (in cud) because the particle size is too big to pass through from the rumen to be digested. Once they chew it it helps them digest it down further (because the cuticle on the corn grain is so tough it's hard to break down). Cracked corn is more easily digested, but some say it passes through too quickly. Really it probably all evens out in the end, but whole corn is cheaper than cracked corn by a small margin.

IMO, if you're going to feed a pound a day of something, it'd be better to find an actual sheep feed to feed in the evenings. Sheep feed is more complete and meets the nutrient requirements of sheep better than plain corn. My sheep are now on "maintenance" feed and only get a small amount of grain per day to keep up with the routine of being fed. They probably split a pound of grain total per day (for 4 animals), and I'm mixing half whole corn with half sheep feed. In the winter I change it to all sheep feed.

 

[Mea]

Our Mentor with the sheep used whole corn because she said that" sheep could choke on cracked corn... and a choking sheep was not a nice thing to deal with"

Our goat feed has whole corn in it... the goats seem to like it.

 

[warthog]

Thanks everyone, I am actually feeding a sheep feed, and they only get a handful each day.

It's just when you do research on the net, you get all this information and it seem rather contradictory to me.

I will from time to time give them a little corn because that is what they have been used to and I don't want to upset their digestion.

But temperatures here never get really cold (that said we did get down to 52f here last December/January) and that is really cold for us. But usually we stay in the low 70's and I believe corn is high energy and therefore heat producing.

With regard to price sheep feed is only a couple of bucks more than whole corn for a 50lb bag so cost doesn't really enter the picture.

 

[cmjust0]

I spoke to a lady on the telephone the other night who told me about a wether she bought who died like 3 days after she got him...just keeled right over.

Since he was a new purchase, she sent the carcass off to the local university disease and diagnostic lab for a necropsy.

Cause of death: "Acute rumenitis."

As I was processing that and trying to figure out what would cause a goat to have acute rumenitis, she says -- almost just in passing, like a "oh, and this is weird too..." kinda of a thing -- she said they also found that he had a belly full of corn.

I was kinda like...aha...well, there ya go...previous owners fed him a bunch of corn, his rumen pH dropped, he developed acidosis which probably ate the lining of rumen from the inside, and it became inflamed and he died...acute rumenitis.

Despite the fact that it can be used for almost anything, lots of corn is bad for almost everything.

 

[RockyToggRanch]

Our Mentor with the sheep used whole corn because she said that" sheep could choke on cracked corn... and a choking sheep was not a nice thing to deal with"

Our goat feed has whole corn in it... the goats seem to like it.

I use JandJ feed and there's whole corn in it as well. Other goat feeds I've tried have cracked corn in them. I have a doe that picks out all of the corn and then misbehaves on the stand until I give her more straight corn.

 

[warthog]

Given the choice my goats would eat all the corn they could get, but they don't get any.

They would literally kill each other for a kernel of corn.

It was just that I was reading all this information on sheep and just wondered.