Goats can be raised in mangrove areas

Goats don’t feel like strangers in mangrove areas.

On the contrary, they feel at home in these places, as found in a study done by researchers of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources-Ecosystems Research and Development Service (DENR-ERDS)-Region 6.

The research team, headed by Dr. Lamberta Meraña, covered Barangay Cabuyao Sur, a coastal community in Padre Burgos, Quezon.

The project’s cooperators/beneficiaries were encouraged to plant bungalon (Avicenia marina) in the area. Initially, a pair of goats (male and female) was awarded to couple cooperatives/beneficiaries and fed with bungalon.

The plant increased the live weight of goats as compared to pure grasses and combination of grasses and mangrove species, based on the project’s evaluation conducted by the Philippine Council for Agriculture, Forestry and Natural Resources Research and Development (PCARRD).

After the mother goat gave birth, the pair of animals (parents) was awarded to another couple cooperator, leaving the kid (young goat) to the original cooperator and so on until all the cooperators were awarded ruminants. – RAF