Table of Contents
Episode 6
For the Love of Goats
Worms in goats are a common problem, and resistance to chemical dewormers is growing. Would you like to have an all-natural feed for your goats that was scientifically proven to kill intestinal worms, coccidia, and even housefly larvae in the goat manure? What if that food was also non-bloating and reduced the somatic cell count of milking does? Sericea lespedeza does all of that!
Today I’m talking to Tom Terrill, Ph.D., of Fort Valley State University in Georgia, an animal science professor and researcher who has studied sericea lespedeza for more than a decade. Dr. Terrill talks about how to incorporate lespedeza into your goats’ diet as forage, as pellets, or as hay. He also provides tips on planting and growing, as well as harvesting lespedeza hay.
Here is a fact sheet about sericea lespedeza authored by Dr. Terrill. Want more to read? Here are more than two dozen other studies and articles about sericea lespedeza, most of which were written by or co-authored by Dr. Terrill.
In the podcast, we also talk about all of the incredible research you can find on parasite control at Wormx.info, which is the official website of the American Consortium of Small Ruminant Parasite Control.
Some varieties of lespedeza grow wild in the eastern half of the United States and other parts of the world. However, if you aren’t lucky enough to have it growing wild on your farm, you can buy seeds and plant it in your pasture or hay field. To purchase the AU Grazer lespedeza seeds or pellets, you can contact Sims Brothers.
We also talked about a farmer who sells lespedeza hay in South Carolina. Reed Edwards can be reached at 864-871-2575.
Tips for using sericea lespedeza to control parasites in your goats and sheep
- Feed as 25% or more of the diet
- For control of coccidia or barber pole worm, begin feeding at least two weeks prior to periods of stress, and continue to feed for at least six weeks afterwards
- Susceptible animals include kids at weaning and does that have recently given birth
This map, courtesy of Dr. Terrill, shows where lespedeza grows throughout the world:
This episode was sponsored by GoatsGivingBirth.com, an online course that I created to help you survive kidding season without losing your mind.
You can also listen to and subscribe to my podcast on Apple, Google, Spotify, Stitcher, TuneIn (Alexa), and iHeart.
Other episodes on dewormers:
- Episode #68 – New Goat Dewormer Guidelines
- Episode #30 – Copper Oxide as a Dewormer
- Episode #24 – Using Dewormers Correctly
Want to know what is the 5-point check for parasites, and how you can use it to determine when you need to use a dewormer? Check out this podcast episode.
Transcript
For the love of goats. We are talking about everything goat, whether you’re a goat owner, a breeder, or just a fan of these wonderful creatures. We’ve got you covered. And now, here’s Deborah Niemann.
Deborah 0:19
Hello everyone and welcome back. Today’s episode we are going to be talking to Dr. Tom Terrill, a professor of animal science and a researcher at Fort Valley State University in Georgia. Today’s episode is brought to you by the online course www.goatsgivingbirth.com. Of course, I developed to help you survive kidding season without losing your mind.
Deborah 0:44
Welcome to the show. Tom, I’m really excited to have you here today to talk about sericea lespedeza, and how this can really help goat breeders. Can you tell us a little bit about what exactly it is and why goat owners should know about it?
Dr. Tom Terrill 1:04
Certainly, sericea lespedeza is a warm season perennial legume. Originally, it was introduced to the United States from China or Australasia region. And it’s been around for a little over 100 years. And historically, it was used in the US for road bank stabilization and for soil conservation, it has a tendency to shed its lower leaves, and it was used for feed and for soil conservation back in the 30s and 40s.
But the plant that was used at that time had rather thick stems, and was not very palatable for animals. And over the last 50 or 60 years, there’s been a breeding program at Auburn University that’s resulted in the release of a lot of newer types of lespedeza that still have high tannin content, but also have thinner stems and better tolerance degrading and that’s been one of the main things that’s the reason why I goat owners need to know about it, is we’ve done a lot of research lately in its medicinal properties for animals.
And as most goat owners or sheep owners would know, one of the primary problems in producing small ruminants, is infection, like gastrointestinal nematodes and coccidia and other internal parasites. And we discovered probably about 15 years ago or so that lespedeza has a very unique type of tannin. And that gives it a very strong bioactivity against these internal parasites. And so that’s kind of we just generate a lot of interest in it as a kind of a natural way to control parasites in small ruminants.
But I mean, it’s also got, historically it was known as poor man’s alfalfa, because it would grow in very poor soils and acid soils and, so they had a lot of agronomic things going for, previously even before they knew about the bioactivity, which was, like you say, it’s a low input forage that’ll grow in most types of soils. You know, it will respond to fertilizer, but it’ll also grow in a lot of places where other legumes don’t grow.
Like in Georgia, we have an acid subplane and, and the roots of lespedeza grow right through it. And so it’s, it becomes very drought tolerant, and once it gets established, and so it’s got a lot of agronomic things going forward. But, but recently, we’ve had quite a bit of activity or research dedicated to this to the medicinal properties.
And my main work here has been with looking at its activity against haemonchus contortus, which is a bloodworm which is the primary parasite that affects small ruminants throughout most of US and also coccidia and it’s extremely high activity against them and the very first study we did with it the hay, it killed close to 70% of female haemonchus which are the ones that lay all the eggs.
And then in the with a coccidia study we did it reduced osis counts by over 90% within a week and so it’s really generated a question and a bit of interest for that alone, but then there are some other things that it does bioactivity wise and it reduces methane production in the rumen. And so it’s good for greenhouse gases. And also, interestingly enough, it actually kills housefly, larvae in manure. And so the others, we’re still figuring out some of the other things that it’s good for, of course, it’s also a non bloating, forage.
Deborah 5:27
That’s awesome. So are there places that it grows wild? Or does somebody have to plant this if they want it on their farm?
Dr. Tom Terrill 5:36
It’s back in the, probably the 30s and 40s, USDA, it was really an important forage for soil conservation. And so it was planted, they’re given seeds out, all over the eastern US. And so it’s actually growing wild, basically, on roadsides, and in a lot of places, it’s actually considered some of the midwestern states it’s considered a noxious weed, but this was the older common type of lespedeza, because it is such a good seed producer. But the types that are available now, like a grazer, and some of the ones are thinner stems and grazing tolerance and so forth don’t have that invasive quality that and so there. But yes, it is growing. If you’re driving along a country road in Georgia, I’m sure you’ll have lespedeza growing, and throughout much of the southeast.
Deborah 6:38
Okay. And so if somebody doesn’t have it growing wild on their farm, is it difficult to plant? Like, do you have to need an inoculant? Do you need to take a coffee can into your field and do frost seeding or how do you get it going on your farm?
Dr. Tom Terrill 6:55
What we recommend is a very tiny seed. And so we recommend first that you get a good certified seed. And I can give you the name of the company that sells the seed. It’s AU Grazer, the main one that’s sold now for pasture and for hay. Some of the older types of ones that were called Interstate 76, and Sarala. And a few that came out in the 60s and 70s are still used for road bank stabilization and mine soil reclamation and things like that.
But if you want to use it as a feed, I would recommend a company called Sims Brothers Incorporated in Union Springs, Alabama, I can give you their contact information at some point but they’re the exclusive producers of this AU Grazer. They do sell it to other companies that resell it, but they’ll also ship it directly to whoever. They shipped all over the US or even overseas. But as far as planting it, normally it’s a warm season legume. And so it’s planted in the spring after the final problem with frost has passed.
And so what we recommend is that you have a well-prepared seedbed and you kind of smooth it out and then it’s ideal to use a culture packer seeder or you can just broadcast it and then run over it with a culture packer. Really, the key is to keep it no deeper than a quarter of an inch, you know because it’s such a small seed that it’s just too deep and then it may not be able to make it to the surface before it runs out of reserves or whatever and so that’s really the biggest challenge is getting it established.
And there has been some work that it’s probably the optimum temperature for it to germinate is 20 to 30 degrees Celsius, which is kind of later in the spring. But then if you don’t have rain then you’d have some problems and so what we recommend is just kind of wait till maybe around April. It depends on where you are, further south, you can plant it earlier. What you want to be past the time when you get heavy frost and down into the 20s Fahrenheit basically.
If it’s frosted it’ll go dormant and it normally goes dormant for the wintertime. But you do need to use an inoculant, I mean if you just went out and planted it would come up and do pretty well. But inoculants are a very cheap type of insurance. It’s a cowpea type inoculant. It’s very common. And so it’s not hard to, it’s like you say, it’s always a good idea with these legumes to use some sort of a little inoculant with them.
And this, it’s really good, you know, one of the farmers that just gave a talk here, he’s a very good farmer from South Carolina. But he was telling us how he does it is, he just makes a sticky concoction of sugar water, like a cup of sugar, four cups of water, and then mixes, which is an inoculant, and then mixes it with a seed, and then lets it dry for a little while, and then puts it in his seeder box and, and works quite well.
Deborah 10:48
Oh, okay, that doesn’t sound too complicated.
Dr. Tom Terrill 10:52
No, it’s really not. And even if you don’t inoculate at all, I’m sure you still get a pretty good stand, because the inoculant seems to be a very common thing in most of the soils, but it is slow to germinate. And so we kind of, we normally recommend, depending on rainfall, and so forth, not to cut it for hay or graze it during the establishment year. And just let it kind of set seed in the fall.
And then when it frosts, that seed will fall to the ground and you’ll have kind of a seed bank for the following years and, it usually thickens up and, as long as you have a pretty good stand the first year, it’ll usually thicken up very much by the second year, and you’ll have a very good stand.
And you’ll be able to jump right off the ground, and you’ll have a good stand the first year and then you can graze it or cut it for hay that first year. But we tend to advise against that, because, it’s a long term investment kind of plant. I mean, some of the plants that are growing along the roadsides have been there 50 years, and it’ll stay where you’ve planted. And so to get through the winter, depending on how far north you are. And I know y’all are a little bit further north up in Illinois. It needs to have, your last cutting of hay or grazing, whatever should be stopped sometime around the middle of August, something like that. Or, down this way, we could get a cutting of hay around Labor Day, but then leave it alone so that it can regrow enough to put some energy into the roots so it can get through the wintertime.
Deborah 12:51
So if you can’t grow it yourself, maybe you live too far north or something, then is it I understand that they make leaf meal and pellets and stuff like that.
Dr. Tom Terrill 13:06
They do. Again, this Sims Brothers actually produces the pellets, and they’ve been making leaf meal, these leaf meal pellets for quite a few years. And they sell, they ship that all over as well. And so they’re a great source for the seeds, and the pellets. Then individual farmers we’re really trying to get more farmers interested in selling it as hay. This farmer in South Carolina, he’s been really pushing the quality of Lespedeza hay and because of its anti-parasitic value, he gets more for his Lespedeza hay than he does for his alfalfa hay. I think he sells his Lespedeza hay for $15, a square bale or something and alfalfa for $10 a square bales and mostly to the small ruminant people, because they’re, they’re the ones that really need it for the anti-parasitic effects.
Deborah 14:08
How do goats like Lespedeza? Do they eat it pretty readily?
Dr. Tom Terrill 14:12
They do even cattle and sheep and goats all like it as hay. Goats eat it straightaway as pasture. Sheep take a little bit of time to get used to the tannin content. It kind of gives a sticky taste in their mouth, but goats don’t seem to mind that. And so they’ll graze it right away. They’ll eat it as hay, they’ll eat it as a salad. There’s really been no problem at all with palatability, particularly with the hay or the pellets.
Deborah 14:47
Okay. And is it good for all animals like bucks, pregnant does, nursing kids?
Dr. Tom Terrill 14:54
It is and you know what, what we say as far as feeding it, a lot of our work lately has been on trying to deal with parasites. And so we’re, we recommend feeding it to animals around the time when they’re under the highest stress, such as at weaning time with kids or, during parturition, and for an early lactation, whenever the does are under stress, that’s normally when they’re most susceptible to parasites.
And particularly with kids, that’s when they usually have coccidia outbreaks. We did a study with kids that we got from South Georgia, where we took them directly from the mother and put them directly on a truck and then started a trial, which really increased their stress. And the group that had not been given Lespedeza, their coccidia just went crazy, and went up to 40,000 oocysts per gram of feces, whatever in a week. And the Lespedeza actually went down.
I mean, it was just, didn’t go up at all. And so it’s really had a remarkable effect on, I don’t know if that’s due to stress relief or what it was, but, but it certainly had a very strong effect, positive effect of reducing coccidia. And we’ve seen that with both goats and sheep. And of course, there’s potential for other animals, we haven’t tested that yet. But we’ve seen it, we’re seeing very similar things with the periparturient rise with sheep, you can actually suppress that by treating them with Lespedeza.
We recommend feeding at least about 25% of the diet of Lespedeza, and maybe up to about 50%. And that’s, that should be enough to give their anti-parasitic effect. And then, but we recommend starting feeding and maybe two weeks before you expect the stressful event, and then at least up to six to eight weeks afterwards. And so your Lespedeza, in general has, it’s not quite as high protein as alfalfa and a few others, but it’s, it’s a very good feed for certainly older animals. And it’s very good for younger animals during times of stress, you know that as they get past that and they start to grow, and they need really high quality feed, then you can start to switch them to a different feed maybe after six to eight weeks or whatever.
And that’s when, when they’re past the really challenging time for parasites. So it doesn’t hurt bucks, that the question that you’d had earlier about calcium and so forth, but, I think a key with Lespedeza, and same with alfalfa or anything else is that it doesn’t need to be 100% of that. It just needs to be a component of the diet, and they’ve never had any issues with that, when we keep it, we fed it up to 75% of the diet and never seen any issues with too much calcium or anything else.
And so I really don’t think it’ll be a problem at all actually, with I think the issues you might have as if you’re, if you’re grazing it, it’ll take a while if you have sheep, take a while for them to get used to it. And then they’ll, have farmers in South Africa and other places that graze it all the time with cattle and sheep. And once they learn to graze it, and then, they come back to it very quickly. And yeah, just takes a little while but goats don’t seem to have that issue.
Deborah 19:01
I’ve read that you shouldn’t feed it to kids for more than about eight weeks. Why is that? And then once you take them off of it, when can you start feeding it to them again, like how much of a break do they need?
Dr. Tom Terrill 19:14
We started a few studies where there was after about eight to 10 weeks. There was, some of the gains started dropping off. I mean, they were still gaining but they weren’t gaining as much as they were with the other diet that they were on and so that’s where that recommendation came from.
And but we’ve had other farmers that have just kept them on it continuously. And, they’ve done very well but, depending on if they’re still under a parasite challenge, I would just maybe reduce the level and take it down to 20% of the diet or and just, maybe keep it closer to 50 to 75% during the during the time of stress, and then just reduce it over time. Yeah, and that’s put it on to, whatever your normal growing ration is.
But, because of his, even young growing animals are still susceptible to parasites, I wouldn’t take them off of it altogether. Because like I said it doesn’t, it doesn’t hurt them, it’s just gaining as, just a couple, we’ve had other studies where they would gain consistently for 15 weeks, or whatever the time was of the study. And we didn’t see that drop off.
But the scientists were kind of being overly cautious, I think earlier. But that’s, that’s where that suggestion came from that, you know, after, I think there was some evidence to that, that certain levels of molybdenum went down after eight to 10 weeks. But we didn’t really see what effect that had and how that was related to growth or anything else. And so they still were getting adequate nutrition. And so, but that’s, that’s kind of our recommendation now is that we, that we stop it after eight to 10 weeks, or reduce it.
Well, we have, if you did want to take them off of it completely, and then monitor them, for the parasite challenge. And then just, if they’re, if they start increasing, then just put them back on it. Or that I’ve had farmers take animals that are not looking good from parasites and just put them in there and let them graze Lespedeza for two or three weeks. And they said that, I don’t have scientific proof of that yet. But they said it makes it look better. And so that’s and that seems to help.
And so that’s it really anything you can get into them, that the more generally, the more Lespedeza you get into them, the more anti-parasitic effects you’ll have. It’s just a question of, where’s the balance or, you may not gain as well, after a certain point. And so you have to kind of play with that a little bit. And we’re still trying to figure all that out. But I think at 25% of the diet, you would get, you still get reasonable gains, and also get some parasite control.
Deborah 22:31
Another thing I noticed in the list of benefits for livestock is that it reduces the somatic cell count in goat milk. Does that equate to a lower risk of mastitis?
Dr. Tom Terrill 22:43
It should. You know that that was a study that was done several years ago? And, that’s I don’t know that that’s been widely repeated. But it obviously caught my attention, because, there’s, just make sense. It has a lot of antibacterial qualities. And so it seemed to have some of that, in that particular study. And that’s, I would assume, if it’s reducing mastitis-causing bacteria, that would really reduce mastitis. And so, yeah, that still needs to be proven, and probably more research done on it. But it’s, it was one of the studies that was done. And so it certainly caught my attention.
Deborah 23:31
Can you give us more information about making hay with Lespedeza?
Dr. Tom Terrill 23:35
It was one of the things to remember, particularly if you’re making in the hay is that the leaves drop off, they dry very quickly. And so that’s one of the reasons it’s good for soil conservation. But if you’re wanting to feed it, you want to keep the leaves on. And so really, a key is that it will dry in about half the time it takes for other forages to dry like alfalfa.
And because it’s stems are a lot thinner, Lespedeza and so it’s, and so it’s, but what we have a farmer again, this fella Reed Edwards has figured out how he does it is he if you get a couple of good drying days, they’ll cut it in the morning and then use the tedder on it while it’s still moist. The leaves don’t fall off and he lets it dry for maybe a day and a half. And then he lets it kind of re-moisten the next morning, and then he uses a little handheld moisture meter. And he says whenever the moisture normally in the morning goes down from about, the humidity goes down from about 100% and then when it reaches 60% next to the bail, he said that’s about 16% dry matter, and that really preserves almost all the leaves and he’s been able to do that. Get some very high-quality Lespedeza. And that in that last picture was one of his bails on the top there.
But why you want to keep the leaves is that’s where most of the tannin and most of the protein is. And so from a nutritional standpoint, and from a bioactivity standpoint, the more leaves you can keep, the better it is. And so I really feel like we’re just kind of starting, a lot of my research has been focused on the anti-parasitic effects. And we’re starting now to look more at the combination of, you’re trying to really push high quality, nutrition and maintain the anti-parasitic effects. And so some of these techniques that our farmers are using now to keep more of the leaves are, should really increase the value even more of this forage.
Deborah 25:57 – That sounds wonderful. Is there anything else that you think goat breeders need to know about sericea lespedeza or harvesting or growing or anything,
Dr. Tom Terrill 26:08
If you can point them to our consortium website, we have a parasite Consortium, there’s a section that that worm x dot info, and under topics under there, there’s one with just everything that we’ve ever published on sericea lespedeza, sericea lespedeza is one of the, but there’s also a lot of other, you know, this, this whole consortium came about as to kind of combat antibiotic resistance. And so we’re, it’s really an alternative to drugs, it says, things like lespedeza plants and copper oxide wire particles, and just a lot of different things. And so there’s just a wealth of information on that website. And people can really find what they need.
Deborah 26:56
Yeah, I’ll definitely include that in the show notes. This has been so much fun. Being in Illinois, and not having the opportunity to grow this and not being able to find it anywhere. I don’t know, I don’t have any personal experience with it. I know, I’ve always wanted to try it. But the shipping to Illinois has been pretty outrageous. So it was been really great to be able to talk to you about this today and get more information about it from someone who’s done so much research on it already.
Dr. Tom Terrill 27:25
Absolutely. It’s been. It’s been fun to me, I just see so much potential for it. I mean, it’s, and I don’t know if it’s global warming or what but soon as weather says there’s they’re seeing people further and further north in the US actually buying seed and coming back for more seed. So it’s an indication that it’s, it’s doing better in some of those places. And so, it may be coming to Illinois sooner than you think.
Deborah 27:53
Yeah, that would be exciting. I know, somebody in Tennessee, who had it growing wild in her pastures, and she had no parasite problems.
Dr. Tom Terrill 28:03
Right! Yeah, I hear that over and over again. And the people that have it don’t seem to have the parasite problem. And so it’s just a matter of managing it to keep it young. And or cutting it for hay, yeah, and that’s it. Because even as one of the challenges when you cut lespedeza for hay, is it doesn’t bloom, so you have to go based on the height. And so it’s, you don’t want it to get above, maybe, 20-24 inches tall, because then it starts to get to woody.
And that’s, and so if at all possible, you kind of below that, but even then, if it gets to 30 inches tall, or whatever, the top 18 inches or whatever, are still supple and, and high quality. And so you can still get a, you know, the leaf, the leaf doesn’t change much. And so you can even if you cur it then and fed it to animals, and if they could pick through and get the leaves, they still get good quality hay. And so anyway, there’s a lot left to be done. But we’re very excited about the potential, not just here, but all over the world, actually.
Deborah 29:17
Yeah, that’s really exciting. And it’s fun to see all the other places. I should put a link to your map. I should put your map also, in the show notes that people can see all the places that it grows.
Dr. Tom Terrill 29:29
Sure, yeah. I’ve been doing quite a bit of work in southern Africa, it’s really got a lot of potential for that. Like it goes extremely well in some of the acid soils in South Africa and some of the surrounding countries. Thank you for letting me do this. This has been fun.
Deborah 29:49
Yeah, thank you. We’ll have to chat again. So I know you’ve done a lot of research on other stuff as well. So maybe we’ll come back on some time and talk about one of those other topics.
Dr. Tom Terrill 29:59
Absolutely. If you check out that website, you can see all the different things that our consortium has been working on. And so there’s quite a bit of information.
Deborah 30:09
Oh, yeah, I love that website. All right. Well, thank you so much.
Dr. Tom Terrill 30:14
Alrighty, thanks a lot.
Deborah 30:17
And that’s a wrap for this week. Be sure to join me again next week as I interview Sue Beck, the president of the Kinder Goat Breeders Association, as we talk about the joys of owning that wonderful breed of goat. Bye for now.
Thank You Deborah.
You’re welcome! I hope you found it helpful!
where can you find the pellets And hay For this lespedeza hay?
There is a link to Sims Brothers in the article. They are the company that makes them. You could ask them if there are any distributors in your area. If not, they do ship.
Did you ever find it anywhere with cheaper shipping?
Hi Carie
Shipping is going to be super expensive.
The best option is to find a local feed store or co-op that carries the pellets.
What I did, was find a feed store that carried New Country Organics brand feed, and asked the owner to add the pellets to his in store inventory 🙂
~Tammy
Wonderful interview. Dr. Terrill had great information and Deborah you had great questions. I will definitely check out the additional info about the pellets and such. Does not sound like it would grow well here in the rocky mountains.
Glad you enjoyed it! I agree about it not looking good for growing in your area. The map doesn’t really look like it goes quite that far. If you call or email Sims Brothers, you might ask how far west it grows.
I’ve heard before from a couple that have been dairy goat breeders for a long time that if you feed too much lespedeza that it can cause your phosphorous ratios to be off balance. If I remember correctly, they suggested keeping lespedeza at around 20-25% of your goats’ diet. Have you also heard this?
They were quite enthusiastic about having lespedeza as part of their feeding program and had used it successfully for many years. And of course, they seldom had trouble with parasites.
Dr. Terrill did not have any nutritional problems come up in any of his research, but they were only feeding lespedeza during parasite season. If you’re using it for coccidia prevention, you start feeding it two weeks before you anticipate a stressor for kids (such as weaning or selling) and then continue to feed it for six weeks after the stressor (so 8 weeks). It’s not meant to be fed 365 days a year. The minimum to feed for parasite control is 25% of the diet, but he has gone up to 75% in his research with no ill effects. There are a lot of variables. This is discussed in the podcast and in his research linked above.
It seems we are battling coccidia more often than not. I am vigilant at keeping our barn clean and tidy, my herd has a 10 acre pasture to graze in and overall living conditions are above average…no standing in muck or mire or feces. This is why I don’t understand why we are seemingly fighting this battle frequently. Is there something that you can treat the ground with that has residual effects to aid in reducing these outbreaks?
No. They have studied a variety of things, including burning pastures, and nothing that like that has been shown to work. The main thing that I have found to help with coccidiosis is kids getting enough milk. They are born with a very immature immune system, and they really need mother’s milk to help them deal with coccidia. We started weighing kids six years ago and found a correlation between weight gain in kids and coccidiosis. Now that we make sure our Nigerian kids gain an average of 4 ounces per day, we have zero problems with coccidiosis, and I refuse to wean kids or sell them before they weigh at least 20 pounds. Here are a couple of articles with more details …
https://thriftyhomesteader.com/how-many-kids-can-doe-feed/
https://thriftyhomesteader.com/preventing-coccidiosis/
Will the bush clover (ornamental lespedeza) work the same for parasite control?
The sericea lespedeza is the one that has been studied, so I don’t know how it would compare. If that grows in your area already, you can see if it helps. But I wouldn’t plant it for that purpose since it has not been studied.
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I have the ability to buy AU grazer hay bales here in N Mississippi. Is there any issue with providing Lespedeza free choice year round instead of a grass such as Tifton 44 (Bermuda) to adult goats, buck and doe, along with a high quality feed?
Feeding is complex. I’d suggest listening to the podcast. Lespedeza is a legume, so it’s pretty rich for bucks and wethers. It’s better for milkers and growing kids. However, in the podcast he mentions a study where kids’ growth started to slow down at some point if they were fed lespedeza continuously. Sorry I don’t remember how long because we recorded this last year.
This type of Lespedeza is considered invasive and hard to control. What aare other species, native to the US?
The “invasive” label varies from state to state, so it is possible to grow it in most states, if you are in the right USDA zones where it can thrive.
Other types of lespedeza probably have some parasitic properties, but they have not been studied.