What does nutria eat: what does it eat in the wild and at home, food list

Keeping nutria at home can be profitable. In the matter of cultivation, feeding is not the last place. Consider what nutrias eat in natural and at home, the features of the diet of these animals, depending on the season. What can and cannot be given to nutrias, how to feed animals for meat, young animals, pregnant and lactating females.

What can you feed a home nutria?

Nutrias are practically omnivores. They can be fed with green grass, branches and dry food, grain, vegetables. You can replace all this with ready-made feed or make them yourself.

Green feed

Like rabbits, nutrias like to chew on fresh grass, and in winter - hay. They can be given the same types of plants that are fed to most farm animals: weeds, wheatgrass, garden tops, legume tops, cultivated forage grasses such as clover and alfalfa. Grass can be given not dried and wet, nutria do not suffer from bloating of the stomach from wet vegetation.

Mow it in clean places, away from roads and harmful production. Make sure that poisonous plants do not come across in the raw materials. Dry hay in the shade, store in a dry, dark place.

Dry and roughage

Eat nutria and branches with leaves of fruit trees, grapes. You can give branches of birch, poplar, willow, oak. It is impossible to feed ash, bird cherry and linden, the animals will not eat the leaves of these plants. You can feed them stems and leaves of reeds and cattails and similar marsh species.

Cereals

Nutrias are given grains, whole and crushed. You can give wheat, barley, legumes, rye, corn and more. Grain is mainly given in mash with vegetables. Mixers are distributed to animals in the morning. The grain fed to rodents must be of high quality, not rotten, not damaged by pests, this can cause poisoning in nutria.

Vegetables, fruits

Nutrias eat any vegetables, such as carrots, beets, cabbage leaves and heads, potatoes. It is very useful to give Jerusalem artichoke, both tubers and tops. Animals will not refuse sweet fruits: apples, pears, apricots. Vegetables and fruits should not be rotten, too green.

Compound feed industrial

Nutria can only be fed with compound feed, there is a special kind designed for them.But if it cannot be found, then you can give compound feed for pigs, which animals eat with pleasure. Bird feed is not suitable for nutrias, as it contains sand or shell rock, which are harmful to the stomachs of rodents.

Compound feed homemade

You can also make your own mixes from grain, grain waste, grass meal, dried vegetables and vitamin and mineral supplements. Such compound feed is stored for no more than 3 months, and it must be kept in a dry and cool room. It should be packed in small bags or barrels. Dry compound feed can be given to animals once a day, pouring the entire daily allowance into bunker feeders. With such feeding, nutria should be provided with fresh clean water.

Supplementary feed

In addition to the main food, nutria need vitamin substances and mineral elements. Their sources are yeast, fish oil, chalk, s alt, bone meal. All these products are added to the mash in small quantities every day.

If rodents are kept on a complete feed, nothing else needs to be given.

Water

Nutria need water not only for drinking, they wash vegetables in it before eating. Water should be clean, so you need to change it at least once a day, or even more often.

What is forbidden to give to animals?

You can not offer animals poisonous herbs that can cause poisoning. This is celandine, sweet clover, dope, euphorbia, buttercup. They can not be given either fresh or dry. Rotten and frozen vegetables, green fruits, green potatoes and their tops should not be fed.

Specific dietary planning

Rodents do not need to be fed the same diet, but to make it up taking into account the goals of growing, the state of the body of the animals and their age.

For fattening

Animals intended for meat are given grain and vegetable mash, grass, hay at home. They are allowed to feed and waste from the table. For fast fattening, it is beneficial to use pig feed.

For pregnant women

This type of animal pregnancy lasts 125-135 days. From the 2nd half of her females are transferred to a special diet, more nutritious and increased in volume. Starting from day 65, each nutria should receive 300-350 g of vegetables, 250 g of grain, 60 g of legume grass. When feeding, pour 2 tablespoons of chalk, 5 g of fish oil and a premix into the grain mixture. During pregnancy, females need to be monitored so that they do not get fat.

For lactating females

Lactating nutria are fed the same as adult animals, but the rate is increased by 2 times. Give nutritious grain - corn, wheat, barley and corn. Grass is also selected the best - forbs, clover, alfalfa, bean tops.

What to feed the young?

By 2 weeks of age, chicks can already eat adult food, from this age they are fed with boiled porridge from any grain with the addition of finely chopped vegetables. By 2.5 months, young animals are taken from females and fed with normal food for adult rodents.

Seasonal features

In summer, it is better to feed nutria with dry grain, grass and vegetables, which are given separately. Wet mash should be prepared for 1 time, so that the animals eat them completely, and the remains do not sour. Sour food causes fermentation in the stomachs of rodents.

In winter, they are fed with fresh vegetables, hay from meadow grasses, sprouted grains, reeds, brooms from branches, dry leaves. They give feed. The transition to a seasonal diet continues gradually - within 2-3 weeks.

What does a nutria eat in the wild?

Wild animals live near water, and feed on river and swamp vegetation and its roots all year round. Their diet includes cattail, water lilies, reeds, reeds. Sometimes nutria can eat shellfish, small fish, frogs and crayfish.

Fed nutria in private farms as well as other domestic animals - grain, grass, hay, vegetables, tops and fruits. They can be given waste from the garden, specially grow vegetables in the beds, mow meadow grass. Or use only compound feed on which nutria feed well.

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