RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN NUTRITION AND FORAGING BEHAVIOR OF FREE-RANGINGSHEEP AND GOATS

Goats generally tolerate dry season forage conditions in northeastern Brazil's tropical deciduous woodland better than sheep do, but the mec hanisms underlying sheep and goat response to wet and dry season condi tions are not well understood. We evaluated aspects of nutrition and b ehavior of free-ranging sheep and goats in this woodland to improve ou r understanding of these mechanisms. Body weight changes, dietary bota nical and chemical composition, and daily activities were measured for sheep and goats that foraged in this woodland during four defined per iods of a year. Vegetation available to these animals was also measure d. Although there was much less available vegetation during the wet se ason than during the dry season, body weights and dietary crude protei n content of sheep and goats increased during the wet season and decre ased during the dry season. During the four periods of the year, weigh t changes of sheep, and possibly those of goats, were positively relat ed to the content of crude protein in their diets. Foraging times of s heep and goats were generally greater during the dry season than durin g the wet season and were positively related to available browse and i nversely related to dietary crude protein content. Sheep and goats may have foraged longer during the dry periods because they were spending more time searching through the large quantity of low-quality vegetat ion for dietary items with relatively higher levels of crude protein.