Introduction to Donkey Nutrition (NTRN101)

About the course

This course introduces you to the essential principles of donkey nutrition and helps you provide the right diet for optimal health and welfare. It combines practical guidance with interactive activities, showing you how to choose suitable feeds, calculate quantities, and monitor your donkey’s condition to prevent common health problems. Whether you’re a new or experienced owner, you’ll gain tools to make informed decisions, adapt diets over time, and share best practices within your community.

Modules

• Module 1: What do I feed my donkey?

  Learn what donkeys should and should not eat to maintain good health.

• Module 2: How much do I feed my donkey?

  Investigate how to meet donkeys’ nutritional needs by providing them with the appropriate quantity of food.

• Module 3: How do I monitor my donkey's diet?

  Explore available tools to evaluate your donkey’s condition, to adapt the diet accordingly.

Target audience

This course introduces you to the essential principles of donkey nutrition and helps you provide the right diet for optimal health and welfare. It combines practical guidance with interactive activities, showing you how to choose suitable feeds, calculate quantities, and monitor your donkey’s condition to prevent common health problems. Whether you’re a new or experienced owner, you’ll gain tools to make informed decisions, adapt diets over time, and share best practices within your community.

Why the course matters

Benefits to you

Appropriate nutrition represents a fundamental component of animal welfare. This course helps you to meet donkeys’ nutritional needs. You’ll learn how to build an appropriate diet for a healthy adult donkey. The training combines theoretical knowledge and practical exercises to implement correct nutrition.

By the end of this course, you will learn what to feed your donkeys, how much food to provide and how to monitor your donkey’s diet. Through this training, you'll develop the practical skills needed to improve your donkey welfare and be able to share your knowledge to improve the welfare of donkeys more widely. 

Benefits to donkeys

This course will significantly improve the well-being of donkeys and their hybrids worldwide. It ensures donkeys’ owners have the ability to feed their animals correctly, respecting their physical and behavioural needs. 

Assumed prior learning  

You don’t need to be a donkey expert, but you have an advantage if you have lived and worked with donkeys before. What you do need is a willingness to observe carefully, and a readiness to reflect on local practices.

Sentience statement

The Donkey Sanctuary recognises and celebrates animal sentience, understanding that donkeys and other equids have the capacity to experience feelings and emotions. These emotions may be positive, like joy, or negative, such as fear and distress. As individuals, equids have desires and dislikes, and make choices based on their unique personalities. 

How to cite

The Donkey Sanctuary. (21/01/26). Introduction to Donkey Nutrition (NTRN101). [Online]. https://thedonkeysanctuary.eu-west.catalog.canvaslms.com/