Bigger than a Bread Box: Larger Livestock for the Homestead and Small Farm
Sharon February 24th, 2009
My last post on this subject focused on little livestock for people in cities, apartments and small lots (and people on 500 acre farms who want to keep bees, chickens and guinea pigs). Today’s post is on livestock for slightly (or vastly) larger spaces.
You probably know what your choices are already – the common ones are horses (which provide draft power, transportation, pleasure, great manure, offspring), donkeys (traction, transport, guardianship, manure, offspring), mules (even better traction, manure, transport), Water buffalo (milk, tillage, livestock, manure), cows (milk, meat, manure, leather, offspring), goats (milk, meat, fiber, manure, packing, offspring), sheep (wool, milk, meat, sheepskin, manure, offspring), llamas (fiber, guardianship, packing, manure, offspring), alpacas (fiber, manure, offspring), turkeys (feathers, meat, the occasional eggs, offspring, manure), geese (manure, tillage, weeding, eggs, meat, feathers/down, property alarm/watch animal and offspring) and pigs (meat, offspring, manure, tillage). I’m going to leave out buffalo, fallow deer, ostrich, emu and other fairly wild critters, on the assumption that if you want to raise these, you’ve already done your research. Today will focus on common domestic livestock.
No animal does only one thing – and so no animal should be gotten for only one purpose. Or rather, you may want sheep because of the wool, but you need to have a plan for how to deal with the other useful outputs – and whether you make a profit or get back your costs will probably depend on this. Particularly if you are going to butcher animals, it honors them to make the best possible use of everything you get from them. The old “everything but the squeal” model of pig butchering is pretty much what you want in your animals – so even you are thinking of milk when you get your goats, you need a plan for manure handling, one for what you will do with the kids, etc…
The other important thing when managing large animals (which can be thousands of pounds heavier than you, and even if they aren’t, often with a good head of steam can run you down) is that you work hard to make sure that they mostly get to be animals in the way they are designed to be. That is, try and get them to do more or less what they want to do, or if you have to do something that will displease them, plan for it and have help, whether a good herding dog, a few extra pairs of hands, or the right equipment.
What animals you have will depend on a whole host of things – the time you can devote to them, the size of the animal, your physical abilities, your land base, whether there are potential males nearby for breeding, temperature, water availability and landscape, and your taste in creatures. That last should not be underestimated – my friend who owns the sheep that graze our pastures each year says that there are sheep people and goat people. She is a sheep people. I am clearly a goat people. I’m perfectly happy to help with her sheep, and eventually I may even own a few. But I know my limits – the grand passion for sheep does not reside in me. When a person walks towards a sheep, they walk away, generally (unless, of course, that person is carrying a bucket of feed 
). When a person walks towards a goat, they generally head over, to see if you are concealing a bucket of feed somewhere, maybe in your shirt. Or maybe the shirt tastes good. Or you might scratch their heads.
Now there are exceptions to this – all animals have personalities. There are cuddly sheep, smart turkeys, malleable mules and presumably bad tempered water buffalo. Uncut males of all species are generally more volatile than females, and the young of all species more energetic and excitable. But generally, creatures have their characteristics, and you can broadly speak of them, if not by species, by breed within species.
How much land do you need for any given creature? Well, not much if you are going to buy or cut all their feed – enough for them to be comfortable. But if you mostly want your animals to find their own food (usually the most time and money efficient way), it varies a lot. How good is your pasture? How well an animal will do on a pasture depends on the animal – horses generally can tolerate lower quality pasture than dairy animals, for example. It will depend on rainfall – around here, a cow can be supported on about an acre. In dryer places, it might be 20.
Small multi-purpose farms are generally well suited to multi-purpose, often older or heritage breeds of animals. These were bred when polyculture farms were normative, and while they may not lay eggs as well as the most highly bred layers, or milk as well as the best bred milkers, they often are a good combination animal – they might not produce quite a fine a meat as a Dorset or as fine a fleece as a Merino, but for our climate, Romneys give a pretty good optimization of fleece, meat and suitability to the environment. In a different place, with different priorities, it might be wiser to choose otherwise.
One factor to take into account is cost – I’m sure I’ll hear cries of horror from alpaca farmers, but I don’t think you should spend many thousands of dollars for any livestock – livestock, like clothing, has its trends. This creature or that one is the next hot thing, and people will get rich breeding them. And for a short while that’s true – and then they breed enough that the bottom drops out and they become ordinary livestock again. I’m not convinced that the current trendy livestock (alpacas) are worth anything like the cost of them. On the other hand, if they or something else is perfect for you, maybe it is worth the risk.
So what’s the right animal for you? Well, if you have a small patch of land, there are very small versions of these critters – some geese that lay, live mostly on grass and provide meat for your family might be the best choice, particularly if you live in a tough neighborhood and need an alarm system. There are miniature sheep, and very small goats. I would say that you should probably not get into milking unless you really like the way it organizes your life – I love milking, but for someone with more desire to roam, it could be tough.
If you have the land, your choices are limitless – you can have as many livestock as you want and need. I do recommend that people track their costs, though. Keeping records of food, vet and other costs can be very helpful in determining whether you have a barn full of large pets or actual homestead helpers.
The more you think about animals in integrated ways on your land, the more you will like them – that is, putting animals where you want them, using their instincts and needs to meet your needs is what tends to make them profitable and helpful. So, for example, putting your pigs on ground you plan to garden on next year will get the land rooted up and manured. But be careful about overstated claims about what animals can do – sure, geese can weed your garden. But some of the greens you grow may look an awful lot like greens. Yes, you can have draft horses on 10 acres – but you may find that most of your draft work is growing food to well, feed your horses. Not a problem if you love them and have other reasons for keeping them. But think it through.
Our own journey to large livestock has been slow – we started the farm with chickens, moved on to ducks and then geese and turkeys, and only just last year added the sheep (which are not ours) the guard donkey, and the goats. We’re still mulling over whether we will want more livestock – or if we will be content with our goats.
My own suggestion is start slow, make sure housing and fences are in place, and know what you are getting into – get to know your creature, read about it, talk to people who raise them and learn as much as you can before you are confronted with a real live creature, considerably bigger than a bread box.
Sharon
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You forgot that cattle are also good for draft power. Draft oxen are awesome and powerful creatures.
Lots of great considerations, Sharon. Animals are truly both a gift and a burden.
You write:
“How much land do you need for any given creature? Well, not much if you are going to buy or cut all their feed – enough for them to be comfortable.”
I would urge people to consider rotation of animal species and spaces to minimize parasites, damage done to pastures under muddy conditions, distance to house (flies etc) before planning minimum areas.
Consider food safety/parasite problem if you keep pigs in your garden – “Do not use cat, dog, or pig manure in gardens or compost piles because parasites that can be in these manures may survive and remain infectious for people.” :http://foodsafety.wsu.edu/consumers/factsheet.asp?pid=83
Dairy sheep!
I want one of these:
“and while they may not lay eggs as well as the most highly bred layers, or milk as well as the best bred milkers, they often are a good combination animal”
Whatever it is that lays eggs AND gives milk, even if it’s not in great volumes, I want one.
Seriously, are donkeys good guard animals? I have geese, they are fantastic watch/alarm animals, esp. the Chinese and Chinese cross, but a guard donkey or guard alpaca might be useful. Although since the geese came along, neighbour problems are much reduced.
Fences are the big issue. We have had to add electirc tape to some of our fences because the horses (ok, one of the horses) just loves testing fences to see if they’re real. I am not sure about electric netting so we use ordinary mesh to keep the geese under control and now hot tape for the horses. Hot fencing is possibly best, esp. if you are going to rotate stock thru pastures.
Dairy sheep – do tell risa b!!! Info please!
–But some of the greens you grow may look an awful lot like greens.
Huh?
Is this a tongue twister or a brain teaser?
I think the sentence was meant to read:
But some of the greens you grow may look an awful lot like weeds.
I posted this under the wrong article, I was here then my fingers hit my mouse and ended up under another article Sharon feel free to delete it from the wrong section (Your dump, etc post).
Quote: “Seriously, are donkeys good guard animals? I have geese, they are fantastic watch/alarm animals, esp. the Chinese and Chinese cross, but a guard donkey or guard alpaca might be useful. Although since the geese came along, neighbour problems are much reduced.”
We have a 15 year old gelded small donkey when he was young he was a pest to new calves treating them like interlopers, he’s better now. I have heard female donkeys are better guardians guess they are kinder.
. They just guard against predetors, in our place dogs or coyoes. Its hard to tell if he helps, we’ve lost one or two calves since we had him, suppose we could have lost more without him.
Donkeys don’t guard against humans so no help with pesky neighbours
Sharon I did’t know you have a donkey, is it small (miniature) or full size, male or female?
I am down to one sheep (both are were 10) not going to replace, getting them shorn was just one more expense. May get goats but, well, not till it appears TSHTF is upon us
, dh and I don’t feel like being restricted to milking (dh grew up on our farm when it was a dairy farm and worked with his father and knows the time it involves).
I have one pet, yes pet turkey a female broad breasted white who is quite friendly, she’ll fall asleep on my lap
. To rationalized: friendly farm animals have a place on our farm, entertainment for our CSA folks 
.
I raised meat chickens last summer and am thinking of raising a few turkeys this year, I’ve gotten good at separating food animals from non food animals. Hence one pet turkey and then a few to eat. I enjoyed my meat chickens but I knew we’d eat them (they were cornish x would have gotten too big for their legs anyway)
We have herd of Highland Cattle about 20ish, T bones steak last night, very good
.
Beth
Hi Sharon! Great post (especially when I wasn’t expecting you to post). I have been considering geese…as guard animals…figured trespassers/ burglers would know how to handle dogs…but geese might throw them for a loop. Also we live in an area with lots of wildlife (cougar, coyote, wild boar, etc.) and I heard that although they are sound sleepers they do alert you to everything. BUT, and this is big, how are they to live with? Like you, I have young children. I’ve heard that the Chinese white can be great pets…this is the biggest part of the issue for me. ALSO, we have miniature donkeys (I was going to send you a picture but couldn’t find your email). They are VERY friendly with my kids and of lately, they have allowed my kids to ride them all over the property (they don’t always want to move but they are very careful with them). They do not like dogs, AT ALL and do make a bit of noise but I don’t know how they would handle trespassers as they are a novelty on our road…and I think just about all my neighbors stop and feed and pet them. And for all of you considering chickens…they are GREAT! Even if your children name them all, give them rides on their bikes, and play pirate with them (the chicken is the parrot, of course)…you can still eat the eggs which are WONDERFUL and abundant!
Susan wrote:
“Whatever it is that lays eggs AND gives milk, even if it’s not in great volumes, I want one.”
Well, if you can raise platypus, I’ll have nothing but admiration ….
Also, if people want to start VERY small and basic, they could start with snails and other invertebrates and work their way up. It might be an animal-handling test for apartment-dwellers who do not yet have the land for greater self-sufficiency.
Scratch that last part. I just realized this was a sequel to the earlier post where you talked about that very thing. Oops.
Sorry, yes that bit about geese should have said “weeds.” Not trying to make people’s head explode.
We don’t actually own the donkey, but Xote comes and lives with the sheep during their season in our lives (May to December last year) – he’s a mini, and very cute and sweet. He’s a very, very good guardian, extremely serious about it – he even runs the cats out of the pasture, since after extensive sniffing, he determined they are predators. He licked them a couple of times to make sure
.
We don’t presently have geese – we had a lovely pair, Agatha and Gangulfus, who were sweet, gentle and very good alarms. Gangulfus died, and when we tried to get Agatha a boyfriend, she took off with him for the pond. The two of them lived on the pond for several years, causing a lot of curiosity about the new breed of wild geese that had showed up. Every so often we’d attempt to round them up, which was sort of the “what to do when the guests come” thing, but they always ended up in the water. This was a failure of our fences, not of the geese, however. We were told that they couldn’t fly over 4 foot fences – turns out someone lied
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Our other two were Pomeranians, but I’d like Pilgrims this time, which I hear are very gentle. I think that a lot of it depends on them being handled a lot from infancy.
Sharon
And also I would add-thinking of what to do when things don’t work like they should.
In my case that’s been a total of three pregnancies in two Nigerian Dwarf goats that has ended in three c-sections. Costly and not very sustainable. The two c-section doe is a favorite and will not be bred again. The other one will get another chance but my new rule is babies with minimal help. It makes waiting for babies a somewhat depressing birth/death combo.
And for anyone thinking that pigs plow neatly-think bombing range instead! They are very efficient at turning dirt over but it’s all craters and hills. But maybe that’s just my piggy.
My parents had a donkey that I actually saw with my own eyes grab a fox in his teeth by the scruff of his neck and fling it out of the chicken yard!! And this was a very very old donkey. So they can be great guards. I have a llama guard for my sheep though because I got one for free/
Now’s a good time to get draft horses, as many people are looking for good homes for animals they can’t afford.
We’re getting a bred Shire mare, who’s due to foal in August, for a very reasonable price. We’re so excited to get to raise our own work horse, and my dad’s been dreaming about it since he was a little kid. We’ve had two teams of horses before, and while we don’t use them for farm work really, we do use them for hayrides to attract families to our farm. I’m sure a baby draft horse will be a big draw this fall.
She arrives tomorrow night and I couldn’t be more excited!
Geese are exceptional as guard animals for people precisely because people can’t get round them. I had som Poms in the house yard and no problems with neighbours in the yard. Then a series of problems – someone was using my paddocks to access the back yards of some neighbours. Our next door n/bs actually had a peeping tom who had befriended their dog. So I got a mixed flock of Chinese and 1/2 Chinese geese – wonderful stuff, the young gangders put on great exhibitions of fighting with each other in the paddock, plus at night if they called out we flicked on the floodlights and took torches and went for a look-see.
Trespassers have trouble making friends with geese.
we’ve got 14 geese of mixed heritages–african, chinese, toulousse, american buff, and now a gaggle of goslings, mixed. true they are good watch animals, but our local bobcats have been feasting on our flock. so far they have taken five geese and who knows how many guineas, wh/ don’t always come in at night. so–get a mini donkey?
we don’t have pasture land; we’d have to feed it, but it would have an acre or so of well-fenced land for moving around on, mingling w/ all the poultry. (should we get 2, for company?) i would train at least one of them to assist me–i’m 73, large, walking on crutches. sometimes i fall in the pasture when putting everything away at night. a mini could pull me to my feet.
mini’s are expensive. am i being realistic?
thanks for any advice!
luisa
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