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Stockbreeding : Journal of Animal Improvement, Vol. 59 No. 5, 2005.

Original scientific paper

Growth of kids fed milk replacer

Jasna Kezić
Vesna Pavić
Boro Mioč
Miroslav Kapš
Ivan Vnučec
Zvonimir Prpić

Full text: croatian pdf 104 Kb

page 323-331

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Abstract

Goat milk production in Croatia is mainly based on French Alpine and Saanen breed. Since there had been relatively few researches on meat traits of above mentioned breeds, the aim of this paper was to determine the influence of the breed on the birth weight and weight gain of kids fed milk substitute from birth to weaning. The research included a total of 721 female and male kids, of which 426 kids were French Saanen breed, 245 French Alpine and 50 Hrvatska bijela breed. After birth the following data were recorded: litter size, sex, birth weight and date of birth. The kids were tagged, removed from mothers and randomly allocated to individual cages (18 kids in a box). After consuming colostrum, they were fed in groups milk substitute for kids. Individual weightings were performed every 10-12 days during the experiment. There were 8 weightings in all. The average birth weight of the French Saanen kids was 3.24 kg, French Alpine 3.41 kg and the Hrvatska bijela kids 2.90 kg. The mentioned differences in the birth weight between the breeds were significant (P<0.01). The average kids’ daily gain until 110 days of age was 104.5 g in Saanen breed, 104.6 g in the Alpine and 77.4 g in the Hrvatska bijela breed. In all three breeds the highest daily gain of kids was determined in the first weeks of life (till the 30th day) and was gradually falling till weaning. Male kids had higher daily gains than female kids in all investigated breeds (P<0.01). At the beginning, the average daily gain of French Saanen kids was 233.85 g, the Alpine kids 220.76 g and the Hrvatska bijela kids 173.53 g. The mentioned differences in daily gain between the breeds were significant (P<0.01). The average body weight of the French Saanen kids at 120 days of age was 18.39 kg, the Alpine kids 17.32 kg and the Hrvatska bijela kids 16.93 kg

Keywords

kids; Alpine; Saanen; Hrvatska bijela; birth weight; daily gain

Hrčak ID:

2053

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/2053

Publication date:

1.12.2005.

Article data in other languages: croatian

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