The capability of farmers to assess the body condition of their goats easily and rapidly is of utmost importance especially in commercial goat farming. Judging the body condition on a regular basis, irrespective of number of animals in the flock is considered as a desirable managemental skill. BCS enables the farmer to evaluate the progress of the flock in terms of productivity and is essentially a directory of the amount of muscles and the degree of fatness in the animal. BCS is used for determining feed requirements, judging the health status of individual animals, establishing the condition of animals during routine animal management and are also for assessment of issues related to animal welfare.
Body condition scoring should be approached in an organized mode. Systems have been developed which employs an index of either 1 to 9, or 1 to 5. In each case, a score of 1 is used to describe animals that are extremely emaciated and cachectic and the maximum score of 5 or 9 describes animals that are fat or obese.
Farmers should be concerned with the body conditions of both male and females. A good body condition can make a significant difference and results in higher levels of reproduction. Does that are too obese may not be able to bred, does that are too thin may experience low twinning rates, lower weaning weights and general reproductive failures. The best way to prevent over or under conditioned, breeding animals should be checked for BCS on a regular basis as a means of monitoring the overall health of the flock, and identifying ‘at risk’ animals. Different breeds of goat, and those reared under different climatic and husbandry conditions are expected to have different standard criteria for assessment of condition.
The BCS index may also be influenced by the primary farming intentions – meat and milk type goats. Supplementary feeding can be adjusted up or down by using the body condition scores. However, farmers should take care to make any feeding adjustments gradually. Since, goat is a ruminant, sudden change in the diet can greatly affect the rumen organisms, and may result in health problems such as diarrhoea.
BCS is a fairly simple concept. with practice, a farmer can become proficient in scoring does and bucks throughout the year for efficient farming and marketing.