You’ll find all sorts of recommendations on bottle feeding goats in various goat groups. Everything from pull the kids at birth and use commercial colostrum to others questions bottle feeding except in extreme circumstances. Recently there is also discussion going around if bottle feeding “red top” grocery store milk is causing stunted babies because it is only 3.25% fat. I’m not here to answer any of that debate. I certainly have opinions, which might come out in my instructions below.
How much milk to bottle feed?
I like to estimate how much I’m feeding goat kids by taking their weight and calculating 20% of that. For example I weighed a goat kid today and she was 4 pounds 11 ounces or 75 ounces. 20% of 75 ounces is 15 ounces, so that is roughly what I’ll feed her over the day. Then depending on the age that is how often. She is less than two weeks old, so I spread it over 4 feedings. I’ll put about 5 ounces in the bottle for each feeding.
Feel their bellies
I calculate the amount of milk by weight mostly to ease my mind. I feel their bellies to make sure they are getting enough and not going to explode. It feels a bit like a balloon, I feel to make sure it is full but not taught.
How often to feed
Along with how much to feed being a source of debate, so it how often to feed. I leave kids with their dams for at least 5 days and the main reason is I don’t have enough time to feed more than 4 times daily. I have never had a kid need to be entirely bottle feed, maybe I’m just lucky. When I’ve had super tiny babies I will supplement them with colostrum at the very beginning but try to keep them with their dams are much as possible.
| Age | Feedings |
| First 5 days or so | every 2 or 3 hours |
| 5 days to 2 weeks | 4 times a day |
| 2 weeks to 6 weeks | 3 times a day |
| 6 weeks to 10 weeks | 2 times a day |
| 10 weeks until I get sick of it | 1 time a day |
As you can see my chart isn’t exact. It depends a bit on the size and strength of the kids. I also don’t feed in the middle of the night and sleep a solid 7 or 8 hours, that is unless a goat is sick. That then has less to do with the bottle feeding schedule and more to do with the general treatment of the illness.
What temperature to feed?
When the kids are young I make sure the milk is pretty warm. I don’t do an exact temp, though my understanding is it should be around 102 F. What I do is a put the hottest water that comes out of my sink into a bowl and let the bottles sit in there. When I can’t feel the temp of the milk on my wrist I figure it is warm enough.
As the kids get older I worry less about how warm the milk is. After they are a few weeks old I often will milk an then put the milk directly into bottles and feed it. It has cooled quite a bit at the point they are eating it, but works fine for us. This works especially well once the kids are on a twice a day eating schedule.
What milk to feed?
One of the biggest sources of debate beyond how often and how much to provide when bottle feeding goats is what milk to use. I generally feed goats milk since I have plenty of it, but if I’m ever short I also use whole milk from the grocery store. When I have brought Toggenburg bottle babies home I have found transitioning them to Nigerian Dwarf milk with its higher butterfat can be rough, so I mix it with whole milk for the first week or so.
I have never tried feeding milk replacer, some people say it is terrible. Maybe it is, I don’t have any experience. I do see plenty of commercial goat herds raising kids on milk replacer and they seem to be making it to adulthood.
What else in baby goat raising?
There are certainly more things to think of when raising baby goats such as their overall care, but usually it starts with milk.
