Proper Nutrition

PROPER NUTRITION OF THE LLAMA AND ALPACA By Dr. Daniel Mora from a LANA Expo presentation and notebook

Proper nutrition of any animal is an ongoing and ever changing proposition. The nutrients available in a particular foodstuff will vary by batch, geographical region, methods of production, and many other factors.

These factors can be broken down into three categories:

Animal Management factors. 1) Animal factors, 2) Feed/diet factors and 3)

Animal factors are those influences that are particular to the kind of animals that you are feeding. 1. Unique aspects of the camelid digestive system influence how well the animal can utilize a particular feedstuff. - Anatomy and size of the digestive tract. - Rate of Passage of food through the digestive tract. 2. The food that you feed to the animal may not be the ultimate source of nutrition. - Volatile Fatty Acids, the products of fermentation. - Fermentation allows the broth of many types of microbes who are digesting the plant material. 3. Urea and glucose metabolism are important modifies of the fermentation and the utilization of the nutrients derived from the fermentation. 4. Specific animal requirements of water, energy, minerals, Vitamins and dietary fiber will influence how you ffed an animal. 5. Environmental conditions can be large modifiers of nutritional requirements. 6. The physiologic status of the animal will greatly influence the nutrient requirements fo the animal. Is she pregnant, and lactating, and growing?

Feed factors make it necessary to understand feeds and their composition and how they will affect fermentation and digestion. Forage quality will dictate what type of supplements you will use. 1. Roughages and forages. 2. Energy concentrates. 3. Protein concentrates. 4. Mineral supplements. 5. Vitamin supplements. 6. Other additives.

Feeding management is where you can really show how well you understand your animals and what you want them to accomplish. 1. A feeding system must be based on the herd but be adaptable for individual animals. Not all animals have the same nutritional requirements. 2. You must consider size of, number of, and placement of feeders in a pen. 3. Social behaviors. 4. Feeding behaviors.

An important part of any feeding strategy is the ability to monitor and check on how well you are doing. These include: 1. Animal Evaluation, Body Condition Scoring. 2. Feed analysis. 3. Blood and/ or tissue analysis.