Donkeys in fact, like other equines, tend to graze, eating small amounts of plant material over the course of the day. Sadly, herein lies the conundrum. If you fed donkeys carrots all day long their health and well being may suffer.
So what can they eat slowly, over the day, without their health suffering ill-effects?
What do donkeys eat? The Real Deal
The trick is in the fibre and sugar content. What you want to be aiming for is a feed that is low in sugar and high in fibre. This way, your donkeys can eat consistently without gaining large amounts of weight.
Barley straw is an excellent example of a foodstuff that fulfils these properties. This is due to the fact that it has an extremely low metabolisable energy percentage (7 MJ/Kg) compared to the amount of its approximate dry matter (90%).
This means your donkeys can eat this particular foodstuff all day long without you having to worry about obesity or laminitis. So Barley Straw is one feed that is appropriate, but what about the others, and how do they compare?
Advice!
Although in cartoons, donkeys may enjoy the occasional carrot, avoid using high sugar foodstuffs in their diets as it may lead to extreme health complications.
To fully grasp a comparison between feeds and how they affect our donkeys, we must first understand a few nutritional measurements specific to animal feed and what they mean. Let's begin with DM. As previously explored, this stands for the dry matter content of a feed.
This is calculated by removing all water from the product then expressing it as a percentage of the original sample. So if the DM of a feed is 10%, that means that after removing all water, there remains only 10% of the original product. Now onto ME
ME stands for the Metabolisable Energy within a foodstuff. You can think of ME as the amount of usable energy within a feed. It is calculated per kilogram of matter. So the higher the ME value, the more energy an animal can extract from it.
Generally, this is calculated by how digestible the product is in regards to the dry matter percentage. It is easier to think of it like this. If I have a cake whose dry matter percentage is 100% and my body only uses 50% of it, then the ME is 50%. It's simple when you think about it.
The last aspect we will be comparing will be the Crude Protein percentage (CP). Now the way this is calculated is a little more complex. It is calculated off of the assumption that all protein contains about the same amount of nitrogen (16%). Therefore, if this holds to be true, then one can find the protein content by multiplying the amount of nitrogen by 6.25 (16 x 6.25 = 100).
This then gives you the percentage of protein found within the feed expressed as a percentage of the dry matter amount. Now how does this relate to donkeys? Well for donkey feed we want to be looking at a low ME and a high CP value. This will enable the donkeys to feed consistently without gaining an unhealthy amount of weight.
Donkey Feed Chart!
| Feed | DM (Dry Matter) | ME (Metabolisable Energy) | CP (Crude Protein) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Barley Straw | 87% | 6-7 (ME/kgDM) | 4-5% |
| Pea Straw | 85% | 7-8 (ME/kgDM) | 6% |
| Wheat Straw | 89% | 6-7 (ME/kgDM) | 3-4% |
| Whole Crop Silage | 35-40% | 9.0-10.5 (ME/kgDM) | 8-9% |
| Pasture, Summer | 15-20% | 11.5-12.5 (ME/kgDM) | 14-22% |
| Barley Concentrate | 86-89% | 13 (ME/kgDM) | 11-12% |
| Carrots | 12-13% | 13 (ME/kgDM) | 9-10% |
Tip!
Carrots in the above table were utilized only for comparative purposes and are not to be used as for donkey feed.
Grazing and how it impacts other feeds.
So should donkeys be placed in a grass covered area which provides the ability to graze constantly? The answer, it depends. While donkeys do need an ample amount of space it is also okay, especially in the winter when the grass may be dead, to place them in an area void of grass. However, you must provide them a constant source of food. So while it may be okay to have them in a dirt paddock wherein there is a lack of grass, you should supplement this with an ample supply of an alternate foodstuff such as barley straw. What if you do have a grass paddock though, do you still have to provide your donkeys with hay or barley straw?
The answer is yes, although having grass will mean you shouldn't have to use anything other than straw to supplement their diet. There are conditions, however, where you should limit grazing. This is due to the fact that donkeys originated in locations wherein there wasn't much vegetation and the vegetation that did exist was dry therefore causing them to adapt to a high-fibre diet. Thus, pastures that are highly nutritious require restriction as to prevent overfeeding, especially in the Spring and Summertime wherein the Metabolisable Energy amounts are much higher.
So although in cartoons donkeys can seem to be coerced into providing tasks by luring them with carrots, this is not how you should feed them. The staple of a donkey's diet should be a high-fibre, low metabolisable energy feed. Something that they can feed on throughout the day without gaining excess weight and therefore encountering health problems is perfect. It is important to remember that your donkey originated in places where there weren't ample amounts of vegetation. Although today you can provide that, you don't want to and by providing your donkeys with the correct nutrition and feeding habits you can ensure that they remain happy, healthy and content.
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