Effects of milking frequency on milk yield, dry matter intake and efficiency of feed utilization in WAD goats

effects of milking frequency on milk yield, dry matter intake (dmi) and effeciency of feed utilization for milk production was investigated in west african dwarf (wad) goats at abeokuta in the humid zone of south western nigeria. seventeen wad goats were fed a ration comprising (on dry matter basis) 50% grass (pennisetum purpureum) and 50% concentrate (17% crude protein) at 5% body weight. the study involved hand milking once (at 6.00 am), twice (at 6.00am and 6.00pm) and thrice (at 6.00 am, 2.00 pm and 10.00 pm) daily for 21 and 35 days covering two periods, from june-october 2004 (trial i) and april-july 2005 (trial ii) in a randomised complete block design. kids were separated from their dams at day 14 and artificially reared. compared to twice (2x) daily milking (322.2 ml/day), the milk yield for once (1x) daily milking (181.5 ml/day) was significantly (p<0.001) lowered by 43.7%. milk yield for thrice (3x) daily milking (334.8 ml/day) was however, higher by 3.8% compared to 2x. twice and thrice daily milking were not significantly different (p>0.05). as lactation progressed, day of lactation significantly (p<0.001) affected milk yield and declined by 2.5 ml for each additional day of lactation. dry matter intake (dmi) significantly (p<0.05) increased with milking frequency. the dmi was 6.7% higher in trial i compared to trial ii. day of lactation had significant effect (p<0.001) on dmi increasing by 3.73 g for each additional day of lactation. the dmi for 2x and 3x daily milkings were however not different (p>0.05). milking frequency had significant effect (p<0.001) on efficiency of feed utilization for milk production. the findings of this study indicate that milk yield and dmi increase with milking frequency. therefore, it is concluded that twice daily milking of wad goats optimises milk yield.