I only have one stall for the 2 of them. I lost one of my mini donkeys and got the goat as a companion. I''m in Reno, NV and it's windy and snowy. Any suggestions on how to feed them so the donkey doesn't get into the goat minerals, etc? Thank you!
Greetings and welcome to BYH @Kristy Glad you joined us I'm not really sure how good they'll end up as companions as they aren't the same breeds and speak different languages... Goats really need other goat companions and I'd imagine that mini donkeys are similar. But like I said, I don't know... may be perfect Goats need minerals with copper and I've never heard anything positive/negative about donkeys and copper or any of the other minerals present in goat minerals. Perhaps you can let one animal out before the other and offer minerals to each at that time so they can access them, then remove them altogether until the next day's feeding?
I believe we have some donkey folks on here who might be able to answer your question... @Baymule@Bunnylady@Mini Horses There may be others... @cjc ?
ETA: we have another member that just joined that has donkeys and other livestock... one of his pictures is the POW (smacking head) @SFogg
My first thought is a creep feeder. A creep feeder is basically an area walled off with openings that will let smaller animals pass through, but too small for larger ones. Here's one with alpacas:
Usually this is used with mommas and babies, but the same concept would probably work with a donkey and a goat.
Donkeys are generally pretty smart. if the donkey doesn't like the minerals he won't eat them. What's in the goat minerals that would be bad for the donkey?
I would do as BunnyLady said, and either do something that the goat can go into but the donkey won't (we do this with one of my full size horses and a mini that shares his stall to give the mini somewhere to go away from the big horse), or they make foal feeders that are mounted to the wall at a height that is comfortable for the foal (goat in this case) and then there are bars that you adjust so that the foal's nose will fit in between but the mare (mini donkey) can't reach in between the bars.
Yep on all above. So long as the donkey isn't showing aggression to the goat, they will be fine together. Most all of mine did fine with my goats. Did have one who wanted to guard a herd of goats and nothing could come into the field...even another goat! Some are not so guard oriented.
Mine were not good with dogs, thus fox, etc. And like "most" animals, they were very alert with foals at side.