Evaluating the browsing levels of Saanen, Honamli and Turkish Hair goats on saplings in a forest plantation area

The study was conducted to investigate the comparatively the browsing levels of Honamli, Hair, and Saanen goats on saplings in a new forest plantation site for six months. Several treatments (fishing net, shading, food coloring, and raffia) were applied to saplings. Two years old 30 goats including 10 animals for each breed were used. There was a statistically significant difference among the breeds in terms of their browsing on untreated saplings (p < 0.05). While the effect of measurement month was statistically significant (p < 0.05) for both all treated saplings and untreated saplings, the observation time did not have a statistically significant effect (p < 0.05) except for saplings treated with shading. The maximum browsing was observed in saplings treated with raffia (89.28%), which was followed by those treated with food coloring (75.79%) and fishing net (75.39%), respectively. Additionally, damage rate of the saplings with shading (17.85%) in particular was significantly lower (p < 0.05) compared to the other treated saplings. It was thought that results of this study would make contribution for issues of goat, sapling and forest from a different viewpoint. Considering that forest and goat are not alternative to each other and evaluating goats as a part of ecosystem will be useful to solving this problem.