Animals

How Much Do Chickens Cost?

November 8, 2023 by Leigh Leave a Comment

So you’re interested in getting some chickens. I warn you now, you will become a victim of chicken math if your not careful. But one of the ways to keep that from happening is to really understand what you’re getting yourself into. It’s not as easy as going to Tractor Supply or your local feed store and picking up a batch of chicks. How much do chickens cost? A lot.

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Before You Get Chickens

I feel like I should start every single blog post about livestock by reminding you that you should not get ANY livestock, including chickens until you have a garden set up. I also fully expect you to not listen. It’s just the nature of homesteaders.

In all seriousness, you should be prepared for chicks or chickens WAY before they ever show up on your property.

The Chicken Coop

You have a couple options here when it comes to your chicken coop. You can go as cheap or as expensive as you want. But there are some hard fast rules that you should follow. It should be secure from predators and this includes the human variety, too.

You should make sure that it is draft free, but with good ventilation. There should be roosting bars and nesting boxes. But after that, sky is the limit. We have a metal shed that we use and we like it for the most part, but I’m not a huge fan. The metal has started to rust in less than a year and it’s very drafty in the winter and BOILING hot in the summer. We normally use it for brooding chicks since it is more secure and stays pretty warm when we’ve got the lamps on.

I would stay away from anything that isn’t made from real wood. There’s a bunch on the internet that are composite and unless it is a good quality like the decking boards. There are also a ton of places that shell really nice shed/ coops. If you can build it, that would probably be a better option because at $8,000? My girls are just find in their metal shed, outside or in a tree.

Buckets, Waterers and Feeders

You can absolutely cut corners here, but remember, the more corners you cut, the more issues you can have. For example, I would not get a tiny seven pound chick feeder for your chicks. The reality is that you are going to be filling that thing twice a day depending on the amount of chicks you have. I would get one like this, that is going last them for at least a day but preferably several days.

The same thing goes for waterers. Don’t get a tiny one. You will be refilling it all the time. We have several of these, and absolutely love them. Chicks are able to drink from them with no problems. And we don’t have to worry as much about them running out of water.

Buckets and pans are as needed but you will eventually need them. Pans for oyster shell or buckets for hauling feed. You will eventually need them.

So How Much Do Chickens Cost?

Let’s start with the coop. A decent middle of the road coop shouldn’t cost you much more than $500. I would recommend getting one with a run attached to it so that on days that they can’t free range, they have a way to get outside.

If you want a bigger run, I would recommend poultry netting. You can get the netting and a solar charger for under $600 for GOOD netting. Don’t try to save money here by getting cheap. Cheap means less protection from predators, chickens getting loose, and more. This is the netting we have and it works great.

Your feeders, waterers, buckets, and feed will all depend on your location but should run you about $100 for good feeders and waterers. Feed should be about $15-35 depending on where you get it. I am able to get Non-GMO feed at my local feed store for about $17/ 50# bag.

Supplements will also depend on your area but for a different reason. If you have high parasite loads on your property, you’re going to want to get something for that. We use Corrid for our chicks. We also give them electrolytes in the summer because it gets so hot and humid here in Georgia.

Grand total you are looking at about $1200 before you even get your chicks. Again, this will depend on which coop and supplies you get.

Brooding Your Chicks

Before you get your chicks, you need to have a brooder that is ready to go. I talk in depth about brooding in this blog post. This could look like a large tub with a heat lamp in your living room, like the picture below. Or a metal shed and a bunch of lights. Everyone will brood their chicks differently. If we only have a few chicks, we will brood in the house in a large tub. If we have a ton of chicks, like when we bring home our meat chickens, we will brood in the metal shed.

Buying the Chicks

I would make sure that you have the coop, brooder, and supplies BEFORE getting your chicks.

Usually, you can get chicks for about $3-7 each. This is going to depend on your breed and if you get straight run. I highly recommend getting sexed chicks. This will help you avoid getting roosters and then figuring out what to do with them.

I also recommend getting from a reputable hatchery. We use McMurray Hatchery and have for years. We love them and will probably always go with them unless we don’t have a choice.

The biggest problem about getting chicks is not falling victim to chicken math. I wrote a whole blog post about chicken math and how to avoid it here. But some quick points that I forgot to mention is making sure that you get a chicken coop that will only fit so many chickens. Then making the decision, and sticking to it, that you will only have THIS many chickens. I wish you the best of luck with it.

At The End Of The Day

I can’t tell you exactly how much chickens cost. There are too many variables. But the biggest thing to remember is that a good coop, feeders and waterers, feed and the chickens themselves are not cheap. You will end up spending at least $1200-$2000 before you ever get that first egg. That’s if you do it “right”. You can go cheaper and you ca go more expensive. But your eggs will never be free.

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What Is Chicken Math?

November 8, 2023 by Leigh Leave a Comment

Have the chickens taken over your farm? Because I know they have on mine. Chicken math is a legit phenomenon that every single chicken owner deals with. It starts out as a couple of chickens and ends with an unknown number of chickens and you answering, “I have no idea how many chickens I have.” That’s Chicken Math.

Dealing With Chicken Math

Once you get “bitten” by the chicken bug, you are going to end up with a million chickens. While that may seem like an exaggeration, it’s really not.

How You Become A Victim Of Chicken Math

It’s actually pretty simple to fall victim to chicken math. It starts with your first box of chickens. You’ve gone to Tractor Supply or ordered them online (Ps: We use McMurray Hatchery and LOVE them). You brood them inside and fall in love with them.

Then you have some die on you, or maybe all but one. Then you decide that you need a few more to meet your egg needs. So you order another box of chickens.

Then you realize that you can get different colored eggs! You want the blue, green or pink eggs. Or better yet, you decide that you are going to get the Copper Marans that lay deep chocolate colored eggs.

You go to Tractor Supply to get feed and see that they have chicks and you decide you HAVE to have them. Only to realize that 60% of them are all roosters.

Or, in my case, you decide to start incubating eggs and end up with 20 chicks. Then your kids re-set up the up the incubator while you’re at work…. now you’ve got 40 chicks.

You do a quick head count and realize you have 100 chickens.

Justifying Chicken Math

After doing your head count, you’ll say NO MORE! I’m drowning in eggs! You’ve water glassed a million eggs, you’ve got a bunch in the freezer and you are SO OVER eggs of all kinds. You’ve Googled and Pinterest-ed ALL of the egg recipes.

So you think , “I’ll just sell the eggs!” And after selling a couple dozen to friends and family, you think, “I need more eggs to keep up with this!”

You know it can take up to 8 months to get those first eggs so you go ahead and purchase more chicks….

Now You’re A Victim Of Chicken Math

You’re feed bill is now several hundred dollars a month and you’re trying to figure out exactly how that happened. You start to figure out how to reduce your feed bill because you’ve got a ton of people that buy eggs from you!

But your girls aren’t laying in the winter and now, you have to feed these girls through winter with no income from the eggs. You’ve got to start looking for ways to trim the budget because this is ridiculous.

You don’t produce enough kitchen scraps to feed them so you start a collection bucket at work or the local potluck.

Now We Can Deal With Righting The Ship

If any of this sounds familiar, or you are just looking into chickens, keep reading. I can help you right the ship and become a chicken math survivor!

How Many Chickens Do You Need

So the obvious answer is don’t get more chickens than you need. But the reality is that isn’t going to happen, or didn’t happen. Every chicken owner KNOWS that we don’t need this many chickens. But we still buy chickens every spring because….insanity.

When you make the decision that you are going to get chickens, you need to be prepared for the reality that you will end up with more than you need. The goal is to keep that number manageable.

If you are an avid egg eater, and consume 2 eggs per day, you should have 3 chickens. If you’re entire family is an avid egg eater, you should have 3 chickens per person.

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If you only eat a couple eggs a week, I wouldn’t even get chickens. I would find someone local and support their chicken habit. The reason is the cost of keeping chickens is so high that it’s not worth it. Because those eggs are not free. While you may think that keeping chickens is a must for a homestead, it’s really not.

What To Do With Your Current Chickens

Really, we only need 12 chickens. That’s it. We currently have approximately 40 chickens and 12 ducks. We will be culling the older hens because they just aren’t laying much anymore. We also plan on selling a bunch of them. Again, we really don’t need that many chickens and they have caused more headache over the years than I really want.

If you have too many chickens, I would recommend really looking at your flock. If you have some that aren’t laying, and haven’t been laying, I would go ahead and put them in the freezer. If you have no need for roosters, make sure to get them in the freezer too.

Just remember that chickens don’t usually lay eggs in the winter! There was a huge hype a couple years ago about chickens not laying in winter and I wanted to scream, “They’re NOT SUPPOSED TO!” But I kept my cool and minded my own business.

Do Those Chickens Serve YOUR Purpose

I know that this sounds harsh and maybe a little cruel, but you have to really think about where your money is going and if you are okay with that. Sometimes that means culling animals.

My chickens are not pets. They have one purpose….Okay, they have several but at the end of the day, their purpose is to give us food. That could be in the form of eggs or meat. If they aren’t doing that, they have to go.

If you got chickens for eggs, and they aren’t laying eggs, you need to figure out if you want to spend the money on feed, shelter and other supplies on a chicken not pulling her weight. If you’re okay with that? Then by all means.

I talked in depth about putting chickens to work on your homestead here. If you’ve got a few favorites that are going to live their life on your farm, look at putting them to work. I’ve got a couple that I do actually like, and they will live their life out on our farm. Mostly, because they won’t make good stew hens either.

Chickens are a lot of work

I will never tell you, at least seriously, that you HAVE to do something. There are things that you SHOULD do, but at the end of the day, it’s your farm, your kitchen, your rules. But livestock (chickens, ducks, goats, cows, etc) are all a lot of work. There’s fencing, shelter, feed, buckets, waterers, medications, and more.

I’m not saying that I would never have chickens again. But dollar for dollar and work hour per work hour, they are absolutely not worth it FOR OUR FARM. So surviving chicken math isn’t too hard for us.

How do you survive chicken math?

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How To Tell If Your Goat Is Healthy

October 20, 2023 by Leigh Leave a Comment

This is a loaded question because if you are not completely aware of how goats act and behave, you may not know what is normal or healthy. Then again, you could have a goat that is totally healthy but doesn’t bounce around like you think they should. So here is my best tips for being able to tell if your goat is healthy.

Before we get too far into this, I have a great course on the basics of goat care. I call it Goat Crash Course: Goat 101. In this course, I explain things like types of shelter, types of feeds and hays, basic assessments and so much more! Check it out!

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First Step To Tell If Your Goat Is Healthy

First thing first, you need to have a routine of how you assess your goat. Now, I am a paramedic in real life, so I have a system of how I treat EVERY SINGLE patient, EVERY SINGLE time. It always starts with a scene size up. That means that as I am walking up to a car accident or into a home, I’m looking around. I want to make sure it’s safe, but also what do I see? Is the patient crushed inside a car? Is the patient gasping for air?

Next comes the ABC’s. Airway, Breathing, Circulation. Is the patient’s airway open? Are they breathing? Is their skin normal? Is there blood?

After those first two things, we start to treat based off our findings. If we didn’t find any life threats, we continue on with our assessment. These things are based on the problems we see or the complaint of the patient.

Goat Assessment

When it comes to goats, it’s really no different. Except that they can’t talk to you. You have to get all of this information based solely on what you see and find during your assessment. Which is why learning how to tell if your goat is healthy NOW, when they are healthy is SO important.

If you haven’t already, sign up above to receive our goat assessment worksheet. It is incredibly easy to use but as we go through the rest of this post, we will be using that sheet. I also use my Herd Check Sheet when I am doing my weekly herd checks to make sure I check EVERY goat. I also to write down any concerns or findings I may have on this Herd Check Sheet.

I’m not going to go super in depth about how to treat any illnesses here. The whole point around this blog post is for you to learn HOW to do an assessment. I want you to start getting into the routine of doing this assessment while your animals are healthy before we go down a rabbit hole of treatment.

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Goat Size Up

The Goat Scene Size Up is very, very simple. As you walk up to your goat, do they look at you? Are their eyes bright and alert? Are their ears erect and moving? Do you see an injury? Do you see fluids around them? Are they jumping around like a jumping bean? Are they playing or fighting with other goats? Are they screaming at you to bring them food? What are they doing?

ABC’s

Human ABC’s are the same as Goat ABC’s. Is their airway open? Are they choking or not moving air well? Are they breathing normally? Does it seem fast or slow? Do they have a cough? Are they bleeding? What is their heart rate? Is it fast or slow?

The Head To Toe….Hooves

Once you are past the life threatening concerns like what would be seen on a scene size up or ABC’s, it’s time to move on to your head to hoof assessment. It is exactly what it sounds like, we are starting from the top and working down.

Head- Check eyes, ears, nose, mouth, and FAMACHA. We are always looking for something “off”. Blood, mucus, fluids, swelling, broken teeth, FAMACHA score.

Body- This is a large part of the animal but we are still looking for all the same things. Do you see blood? Is there an injury? Bodily fluids? Body condition? Fur and skin healthy and intact? Legs in good shape? Temperature? Are they chewing their cud? Do you hear rumen sounds? Does the left (THEIR left) side of their belly seem swollen or bloated?

Hooves- Are their hooves normal? Do the hooves stink? Do you see abscesses? Are their hooves sound? Are they limping? Do they need a hoof trim?

What To Do With The Information

Well, that all depends on what you found on your assessment. But I will tell you to head over to one of these 3 Facebook groups:

Goat Emergency Team

Successful Goating With Rosie

The Holistic Goat

These are the goat groups that I have been apart of for YEARS! They have pulled several of our goats through in those first couple years. Plus there is always a moderator that can help no matter if it’s day or night.

Treatment Protocols

Once you can do your assessments correctly and quickly, now we can start diving into treatment protocols. However, I do want to caution you. You need to have a vet or mentor on stand by. Even if it’s only a basic relationship. You never know when you are going to need help and it’s better to know where to find that help before you need it.

Treatment protocols are basically a set of things to do IF your goat meets these certain criteria. For example: I would only follow a worming protocol if I had a positive fecal because I don’t deworm preventively. Another example would be using antibiotics for a cough. I don’t believe in just giving antibiotics for any reason. That doesn’t meant I won’t give it, but it’s not my first line treatment.

If you look through those 3 pages, especially Goat Emergency Team and Successful Goating with Rosie, you will see the treatment protocols that they actually use. Those are very close to the protocols I use on my farm.

Remember To Be Kind

As you are on your goating journey, you need to remember one thing. Be kind to yourself. You are learning. Yes, you will have animals die on you. Yes, it will break your heart and you will want to give up. You will beat yourself up because you didn’t catch something.

But remember what the ole timers say, “If you haven’t lost a goat, you haven’t owned one long enough.”

It’s the truth. These are not extremely hearty creatures to start with. They can be indestructible like Bella or fragile like Champ. But at the end of the day, everything will die. We just don’t want that to happen too soon.

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How To Bottle Feed Goat Kids

September 17, 2023 by Leigh Leave a Comment

Whether you have a surprise goat kid or trying to help a momma out, if you own goats you will probably, at some point, end up bottle feeding goats. This may come in a variety of forms, like getting suckered into bottle babies at an auction, a sudden loss of a doe, or maybe on purpose. But the reality is that there are times when it will happen and if you aren’t prepared, you may struggle to get calories into that goat kid. Let’s not wait till last minute to figure out how to bottle feed goat kids.

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When To Bottle Feed Goat Kids

First and foremost, we really, REALLY want a kid to stay on mom for as long as possible. There’s a couple of reasons for this but the biggest is that the milk from momma is the best for them. Period. Yes, bottle babies can do well being bottle raised, but the reality is that they do much better with momma. Momma’s milk is specifically designed for THOSE kids. Removing those kids from her can lead to unthrifty kids. We don’t want that.

BUT there are situations were you need to bottle feed babies. And that’s okay. I liken it to the argument of breast is best vs formula fed babies. At the end of the day, the only thing that REALLY matters is that the kid (human or goat) is fed. So if you have to bottle feed a baby, no worries. I’m going to help you through this.

Too Many Kids

One of the situations that you may encounter that has you asking, “Should I bottle feed these kids?” is too many kids. Your goat only has two teats. Therefore only two kids can nurse at a time. If you have triplets, quads or quints? You may need to seriously consider bottle feeding a couple of them.

There are plenty of does that can handle trips or quads. In fact, Bella is helping to feed quads right now…. And three are not even hers!

However, Bailey is not a doe that can handle a lot of babies, at least not yet. A couple of weeks ago Bella gave birth to twin girls but we lost June to Bacon the AGH. Three days later, Bailey dropped her triplets. Now, Bailey is not a fantastic milker. She produces, but not a whole lot and now she’s trying to produce for trips? Well, we decided to help supplement her milk with Bella’s milk.

I really wish we had grafted one of the trips but I wasn’t exactly expecting triplets from Bailey!

Not Gaining Enough Weight

Sometimes momma just doesn’t make enough milk. While this can be because of too many kids, it’s not always. After every birth, you should get a weight on every kid that is born. This will show you if the kids are gaining weight. If they aren’t, you may need to supplement milk because momma isn’t making enough.

Usually, this isn’t a problem unless you have multiples. But again, it does happen.

Rejection

Some mommas will just never take care of their babies. Usually, this is because they are young or they’re babies have always been taken from them. Other times, momma knows the baby is weak. Finally, they could reject the baby because the sky is the wrong shade of blue.

If the momma rejects the baby, you have a couple of choices. You can try like hell to get momma to accept the baby, or you can just take the baby and bottle feed. Bottle feeding is a last resort for me. I want that baby to stay with momma for as long as possible. So I will try and try to get momma to accept the baby. If it doesn’t happen, okay. But I’m going to try.

Injury or Illness

If one of those kids is born with a defect, is ill, or has something going on that makes them fragile, I would highly consider bottle feeding. If June had survived Bacon, she would have been one that we bottle fed because her jaw was broken in multiple places. Sometimes it’s as “simple” as a kid not being able to maintain temperature.

Like I said, sometimes these things happen, and you have to be prepared to step in and start bottle feeding.

Hacks For Bottle Feeding Goat Kids

Everyone has a different way of bottle feeding. Some swear that you can only use a teat nipple like this. Others, like me, say fed is best so they get whatever they will eat. I use regular baby bottles. It works great and I can get them literally anywhere.

If the kid just won’t latch, try different nipples. Just like with human kids, they may not be able to work the nipple right. It happens.

Sometimes you need to cover their eyes so they think they are up against mom. We have also found success with rubbing a stuffed animal all over momma to get the scent and then holding that over the kid’s head while holding the bottle upside down.

Other times, the kid may want to be held while they feed. Samantha is like this. She will drink about an ounce or two and then walk away. If we hold her, she will gobble down the whole bottle.

Another thing you can try is to put a little bit of honey or molasses on the nipple and see if the kid will take the bottle that way.

If the kid still won’t latch, you may have to put a stomach tube in and force it. This is usually the last ditch effort.

How Much To Feed Your Kid?

According to the internet, it’s all over the map. Since I try my damnest to keep my kids on their momma, I don’t have a hard fast true rule to give you. BUT this is what I have found that works well for us. You should keep an eye on your kids for signs of overfeeding (lethargic, floppy, grinding teeth, head thrown back, etc).

You want to start with colostrum only for the first 24 hours. Hopefully, you have colostrum from a healthy goat you can use. If not, replacer will work but it’s not as good.

After that first day, start with 2-4oz every 3-4 hours for the first couple of days. Then, I increase to 4-6oz about 4-5x a day for a couple of weeks. Then I move to 6-8oz 3x a day for a couple of weeks. They should be eating hay and drinking water at this point.

Then I move them to 8-12oz 1-2x a day until they are at least two months old.

I would only deviate from this if 1) my vet said to or 2) the kid wasn’t gaining weight. They should be gaining about 5-10#/ month depending on breed. If they are not on pace with that, I would up their feeding SLOWLY to avoid overfeeding.

What To Feed Them?

The goal would be only fresh goat milk. But if you don’t have access to that, the next best thing would be whole cow milk from the grocery store.

Goat milk replacer really isn’t that good. In fact, most goat kids just don’t do well on it. They have issues with bloating, lethargy, and just generally not doing great. It could be that particular goats genetics, but I’ve heard of more problems with the replacers than just using cows milk.

We are lucky to have Bella. She may be a total pain in the butt but she has single handedly supplied us with milk for over a year AND provided milk for her own babies. Plus Bailey’s babies.

I’m also really happy that she gave me a girl! Fingers crossed Ursula is just as amazing of a mother and milker as Bella.

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Animals For New Homesteaders

August 28, 2023 by Leigh Leave a Comment

Welcome to the homestead family! It doesn’t matter if you are on less than an acre or have 200+, you are welcome here. At some point, you will want to get some animals for your homestead, whether that is a couple chickens, a cow or two, or maybe just a good farm dog, it doesn’t matter. I wanted to give you my picks for animals for new homesteaders and why.

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Setting Yourself Up For Success

Before we can get too far down the rabbit hole of what animals you should get, I think we need to first start with what your goals are for your homestead. If you go through my posts on this website, you will find that I am extremely goal oriented and tend to be pretty obsessive about it. I have good reason for it.

If you don’t know what a successful homestead looks like to you, you are going to spend years chasing your tail before you ever hit the first goal. When we start adding animals to our homestead, we are adding more financial strain to the budget. While a bag of feed here and there may not seem like a lot, it adds up really quick. Especially in winter. So be aware that what seems like not a big deal now, could end up being a big financial and emotional deal later.

Which Animals For New Homesteaders?

Now that we have cleared up the fact that you should WAIT before adding animals to your homestead, even though we all know you’re not going to. Let’s start looking at some different animals to bring to the homestead and their uses/ purposes. PS, this list is going to include some things that are not livestock, but bear with me you will see what I’m talking about in a minute.

I want to add a disclaimer here. You and your homestead are YOURS. I practice the your kitchen, your house, your land, your rules. These are my thoughts and feelings. You may not agree with what I am saying and that is absolutely ok. I am not saying you HAVE to get these animals or feel/think/do what I say. So please keep that in mind as you read through this blog post.

Dogs

To be clear and transparent, on a homestead, a small dog is usually a vulnerability because of predators, risk of injury from livestock, and costs associated with caring for a pet vs a working dog. It’s the reality. I’m not saying you can’t have a small dog, but you do need to be prepared for predation.

There is a difference when dealing with dogs on a homestead. You’ve got your farm dog, your working dog, and your livestock guardian dog (LGD). These are 3 completely different dogs and should be used accordingly.

All 4 of my dogs are farm dogs. Their job is to raise the alarm if a predator is close, keep the pigs off the porch, and to hang out with the family. Bear’s only job is to make me happy, which he does perfectly because he’s the best boy.

I believe that with enough training, any dog can be a farm dog. Yes, that is a blanket statement, but it is something I truly believe. Bear is a typical pound special that we rescued 9 years ago from the animal shelter in Texas. He was never, ever raised around livestock or allowed to roam off leash/out of a fence. But he has taken to farm life like he’s been living it forever. A lot of his patience and lack of drive to chase could be because he’s an old man but a lot of it is the work I have done with him over the last 9 years.

A working dog is going to be your active dogs that have a job, think heelers, shepherds, etc. These are dogs that you need to be aware of their breeding and genetics before bringing them onto your farm. If you have a heeler, there is a very good chance that they could hurt or kill your goats or chickens. This is were training is going to be the most important thing you could do for this dog. I would not recommend these dogs unless you have training on lock.

An LGD is a great addition to any farm that has smaller livestock. BUT, and it’s a big one, make sure you are getting an LGD from a working line, that is being trained with livestock, before bringing one to the homestead. While in search for an LGD for the farm, we found a TON of LGD’s that were not bred to or actively protecting animals. That is going to cause a problem for you. An LGD is going to be a whole post on it’s own because their training is so important that it won’t fit into a couple paragraphs.

Cats

If you are going to have livestock, you are going to have issues with rodents. Period. When you start bringing hay, feed, or installing pasture, you are going to start having a rodent problem. While I’m NOT saying get one despite being allergic to cats, I am saying that you need to weigh your allergy against having mouse droppings in your house.

There is a lot of opinions on how cats should work on a homestead. Some people say not to feed the cats because it will make them lazy. Others feed their cats. I don’t think there is a right or wrong answer as long as the cat is fed (either by hunting or you) and healthy. I’m going to leave the rest of that alone.

Snakes

While I have a pet snake, I am not talking about that. I am talking about having several king or racer snakes that live on your property. I live in the south and a walk in the woods or through the garden can easily lead to an ER visit from a snake bite. A king snake will eat rattlers, moccasins, and copperheads while also keeping your rodent population down.

I totally understand that you may not want snakes on your property, but I would highly recommend having a few. We have several king snakes on the property and Frank is my favorite. He hangs out in the hay barn and keeps the rodents out of my hay. Frank lives here rent free until he doesn’t want to because he does such a good job keeping unwanted creatures out of my hay barn. But he will scare the crap out of you if you’re not expecting him.

If you don’t have a king snake on your property or you’re not sure, a good option is to contact your local exterminator or pest control person and see if they will bring one that they catch. Yes, this is a thing and most of the time it’s free.

Chickens And Ducks

Now for the livestock! Chickens are a great way to enter into the farm scene without having a TON of expense, depending on how you set them up. You can absolutely break the bank bringing these animals to the property, but you don’t have to. You can free range your chickens with a small coop and be done. You can throw a kiddie pool down for your ducks.

But be warned of 2 things: 1) chickens are the gateway animal and 2) they are easy targets for predators.

Before you know it, you will have 60 chickens and not really sure how it happened. You will also lose some to predators or sickness. Or in my case, they just wonder off. The ducks stick around better and don’t cause as much issues in the garden but they are messy creatures.

After having chickens and ducks for several years, I am only buying/ breeding ducks from here on out. We will raise meat chickens every year for the freezer, but I am not interested in chickens. The reason is that while ducks are messy, they don’t get in my garden unless it’s not secured. They don’t get on my decks and poop everywhere. They don’t get attacked by predators as often if ever. They produce eggs year round. They are freaking adorable with their quacks and cheese feet. Yea, those chickens got to go.

Other Fowl/ Poultry

I would highly recommend staying away from other feathered creatures until you have a lock on chickens or ducks. Quail would be the exception. Turkey’s are hard to raise. Emu’s are huge. Peacocks are weird. That being said, I would also have a plan for what exactly you are going to use other feathered beasts for. If you like the way they look, ok but if you are trying to set up a working farm? Try not to get a bunch of unprofitable creatures.

Rabbits

While we were researching, planning and learning, the plans were to use rabbits as a meat source…. That never happened. Not because they are cute and cuddly and would be hard to send to freezer camp but because we just don’t have a good place to put them. It gets HOT here in the south and most of the time rabbits don’t do amazing if they are not kept shaded with good air flow. Our options for their space was limited and we just couldn’t do it.

But rabbits can yield a LOT of meat very quickly and pretty cheap. A batch of meat chickens can run you about $1500+ in 8-16 weeks, after everything is all said and done. A trio of rabbits can crank out the same amount of meat for less money. Plus they are much quieter.

Pigs

Despite Bacon eating one of my brand new doeling from our favorite milk goat, pigs have to be one of my favorite animals on the homestead. They eliminate food waste, break up the soil, and taste delicious. They are truly one of the few multi-purpose animals, just by existing. But they have some draw backs.

Pigs are incredibly smart. Bacon and Delilah learned how to sit for their feed within a few days. They also learned how to break out of the electric fencing. So now we have porch pigs until they are big enough for butchering.

The work they do on the homestead has been invaluable for us. We got them after going to the HOA conference and listening to multiple speakers talk about using pigs to help break up the soil and heal the land. When we got home, we bough 2 American Guinea Hogs. Since then they have helped us reclaim a lot of areas that the goats cleared but left us with hard rocky soil. They have tilled the soil and we have the starts of some amazing pasture.

Goats/ Sheep

I added these two small ruminants together because they are pretty similar but also vastly different. Sheep are grazers and need to have mostly grasses to eat. Goats are browsers and need mostly woody plants to eat. If you have a ton of brush, get goats. If you have a ton of grass but not space, get sheep. Goats will do okay on pasture but they really prefer brush.

Goats are incredibly smart and require waterproof fencing unless you plan to free range them.

Sheep are not incredibly smart but will stay put for the most part. But beyond that, I can’t really talk about sheep because I don’t have any. But I can tell you all about goats.

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If you are looking to increase self sufficiency I would suggest getting full size dairy does and a meat buck. The reason for this is because you can have high production, high butter fat milk produced by the dairy doe and the meaty body of a meat goat. While the babies will be mixed, you can easily fill your freezer with quality meat and milk with just a few goats.

Cows

I would LOVE to have a milk cow! I want one so badly but it just not in the cards for us right now. We have the land but not the grass. The pigs are working on it for us but it takes time to build established pastures. But cows are the ultimate machine when it comes to filling a freezer and you don’t need to worry about having a bull on stand by!

Your homestead cow operation would look something like this: milk breed cow + AI meat breed bull semen= meat in the freezer and 1-3 gallons of milk or more per day.

That extra milk can feed your chickens, pigs, dogs, cats, etc. It also freezes well once the cream has been skimmed off. That cream can make heavy whipping cream, butter, creamers, and so much more. Let’s not mention the cheeses, ice creams, sour creams, etc.

Yall, I want a cow!!!!

What Are Your Favorite Homestead Animals?

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How To Raise Goat Bottle Babies

March 6, 2023 by Leigh Leave a Comment

If you are purchasing a bottle baby, have a momma who rejected a kid, or are planning to sell a bottle baby, there are some things you should know and be prepared for. Bottle babies are not for the faint of heart, there is a lot of involvement with them. You become their momma and in turn you end up with a creature that is so attached to you, it’s almost like your own kid. But to raise goat bottle babies, there are a few things you should know.

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First, let me preface this with: I am not a vet. I am simply a goat farmer that has done a ton of research and “experimented” on my herd. There has been a lot of trial and error…. a lot of error. This information is from my vet and from my experience, as well as the experience of other goat farmers. I encourage you to speak with a vet or find a goat mentor local to you.

Why You Have Bottle Babies

If you bought bottle babies from a reputable breeder, there should be nothing “wrong” with them. This should be the easiest bottle baby you have. But unfortunately, there are a fair amount of situations where you may end up with a bottle baby that are not ideal.

Momma Rejected Or Died

While it’s a very sad situation, when momma doesn’t want to or can’t take care of her babies, you may have to pull the baby from her. Or on the other side of the spectrum momma has died and you now have babies to raise.

It’s Just Too Cold Outside

Sometimes, you have to make the decision to bottle a baby based on weather. Which is weird, I know. This late winter/ early spring has been extremely rainy. We are having weeks of rain with a day or two of sun. That means that our barn and pastures are a muddy mess. Not a great environment to raise babies in. We are also in this weird weather pattern of cool/cold nights and 75* days. Because of that, we had to bring Bailey inside after she kidded because it was just so dang cold and wet. We seriously considered raising one of her kids inside just to give her some relief and to ensure that she could care for the other two better.

Momma Had Too Many

Bailey gave us triplets this last season. If this had happened to almost any other goat, we probably would have been okay. But Bailey has tiny udders and doesn’t produce a ton of milk. We had to supplement with milk we had put up. If your doe birthed quads, quints, or sextuplets? Be ready to bottle raise some of them.

A First Time Freshener

Another reason you may have to raise goat bottle babies is because momma is a first time freshener and doesn’t have a clue what she is doing. Jade is struggling a little bit with her kids because she is really unsure how to handle them. She’s away from her sister for the first time and these things are smashing their face into her udders for milk. We had to catch/pull and then clean the babies because she was totally unprepared. This is all totally fine and normal, but you do need to be prepared.

How To Raise Goat Bottle Babies

Now to the meat and potatoes of this post. Raising goat bottle babies is probably no different than sheep and maybe cows. But I don’t have those creatures so I can really only speak about goats.

Dam Raised or True Bottle Baby

The first thing you have to decide is whether you are going to pull the baby from momma completely or supplement feedings. Our goal is to keep kids with mommas for as long as possible. With Bailey, we “let” her be momma and we just supplemented. We started with 3x a day feedings and then dropped to one “big” bottle at night. If we had taken one of her babies to raise inside, it would have been a true bottle baby.

Bottles

There are some people that think the red teat nipple is the way to go. Others think a cheap baby bottle will work. Personally, I think fed is best, so do what you’ve got to do to get that baby to eat. We have the red teat nipples and our goats just don’t like them. We use cheap baby bottles and they work fantastic. If you are purchasing a bottle baby from a breeder, that breeder should be able to tell you exactly what bottle they are using and you can purchase that.

Replacer vs Whole Cows Milk

Whole cows milk is the replacement of choice for goat kids. Period. Actually, the replacement of choice would be goats milk. But if you can’t get that, cows milk is the best. There is a ton of research out there on the milk replacers vs whole cows milk but at the end of the day, cows milk is easier for your goat kid to digest. Whole cow milk is an animal milk but milk replacer is usually a bunch of different additives that may be too hard for your kid to digest and use.

How Much To Feed

There is a TON of information about how much to feed your bottle baby and how often. But first you have to start with a weight. The ratio is about 1#= 2.5oz. So if your goat kid weighs about 5# you would feed approximately 12.5oz per day.

Also the age of your kid factors into how many times per day to feed it. A kid that is just born and is 3# would get 7.5oz of colostrum over 12 bottles.

Week 1: 6 Bottles

Week 2- 4: 4 Bottles

Week 5-8: 3 Bottles

Week 9-10: 2 Bottles

Week 11-12: 1 Bottle (start weaning)

****Weaning would be giving 1 bottle per day with less and less milk. I usually start reducing the bottles by 3oz and see how the kid does****

For example: Your goat kid is 3 weeks old and weighs 8# you would feed approximately 20oz over 4 bottles. Each bottle would contain 5oz.

Over Feeding vs Underfeeding

Goat kids will absolutely over eat if you let them. Momma’s have this instinct that tells them when the kid is done eating. But if you are momma, you may think that your kiddo is starving. They’re not. Trust me. If you are using the formula above and they are gaining weight steadily, they are just fine. The biggest thing to watch for after a feeding is done, their belly should feel full-ish. It shouldn’t feel hard and it shouldn’t be sunken in. My suggestion is this: feed like the formula says for the first couple of days and feel their stomach. If it’s hard or rounded? back off the milk just an ounce or so. If it’s sunken or they aren’t gaining weight? Up it an ounce or so.

Temperatures: Milk and Kid

When it comes to goats of all ages, temperature is probably the most important thing you can master. If your goat is too cold or too hot, bad things can happen. Kids are no different and in fact it’s probably more important. When kids get too cold, they cannot digest the milk. If they can’t digest the milk? It will rot in their stomach. So make sure you are checking their temps before feeding. Before feeding, their temps should be between 101-103. If they are not warm enough, bring them inside to get warm and then feed them when they are at least 101*.

When it comes to milk, the temperature should be 103*. This is about the temperature that momma’s milk would be. Too cold and the kid could become hypothermic (cold). Too hot and the kid could scald their mouths. We check on the inside of our wrists, if it’s warm to hot (not burning) it’s the right temp. If it burns us? It will burn them.

Pro-Tips and Hacks To Raise Goat Bottle Babies

Transitioning

If you are getting your bottle baby from a breeder, the kid should already be on either milk replacer or whole cow milk. If they aren’t, that breeder should send goat milk home with you to transition. When I sell our bottle babies, we send goat milk with them to start transitioning if we haven’t already transitioned them to whole cows milk. When we sold Bailey’s triplets, we were not anticipating selling them that quickly. But we sent a gallon of goat milk with the buyer. Then we dropped off another gallon and a half gallon because we wanted to make sure the transition was as smooth as possible.

Preparing For A Bottle Baby…. Just In Case

After our does kid, and depending on how many she gave us, we bring a pint mason jar with us every time we go outside. When we get singles, we milk out the colostrum of ONE teat over the next 24hrs. We do this so we have back up colostrum and a couple of times it has saved our babies. If we have twins or trips? We still bring out that jar and a bottle just in case one of the babies isn’t nursing great. Sometimes we do it at night to ensure that the kids go to bed with a full belly. But being prepared is key.

Enjoy It

Much like raising human children, raising bottle babies flies by. Next thing you know, they are jumping off the roof of your car… the goat kid not the human one. Unless you have a Jaxson, then it may be the house and not the car. Regardless, it is such a cool experience. That kid will become a pocket pet for you and watching them get so excited to see you is pretty cool too. Not to mention when you are feeding them and that little tail is going a million miles a minute? Ridiculously cute. And while it’s a TON of work, it’s so worth it.

How To Save Money On Livestock Feed

November 22, 2022 by Leigh Leave a Comment

Whether you homestead on a large scale or small, livestock feed is expensive. To be fair, raising livestock in general is expensive. But with the holidays on us, plus supply chain issues and inflation, saving money is becoming more and more important. These tips are how we save money on livestock feed.

How To Save Money On Livestock Feed

Just Add Water
Grow it
Microgreens or Sprouts- Another great way to stretch feed
Buy in bulk
Reduce animal numbers.

You could also make your own, but that is an entire post all on it’s own so make sure you subscribe below to be updated on that post!

Let’s talk about each one of these a little more in depth.

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Just Add Water

Soaking feed is number one for a reason. It is hands down the easiest, cheapest and fastest way to stretch your feed. All you need is a 5 gallon bucket with a tight lid for each different feed you plan to soak. For example: I soak/ ferment pig, chicken and goat feed, plus alfalfa and beet pulp, which I do together. So I have 4 buckets.

What’s the difference between soaking and fermenting? Time. If you leave your feed for too long in a bucket it should ferment. And if you leave it too long past that, it will mold. We soak our pig feed and the alfalfa/beet pulp overnight. The chickens and goats get fermented feed that we start 2-3 days prior and then add more as we go.

PS: if you ferment your pig feed for too long, or if there is corn in the feed, you will have drunk pigs…. Don’t ask how I know.

Grow It

Right now growing isn’t as easy because it’s winter. But growing crops for your animals is hands down the cheapest way to reduce feed costs. In fact, I would dare say that if you have enough property, or not a lot of animals, you could feasibly never buy a bag of feed. Between grasses for grazing, pasture rotation, and then expanding your garden to grow corn, barley, buckwheat, winter squashes, and more, you could never buy a bag of feed. This could save you thousands of dollars a year for just a few seed packets. You can get almost all of your seeds from Territorial Seed Company or Eden Brothers.

What kind of fodder crops should you grow for your animals? That really depends on what animals you have and what they can eat. But corn is a great plant that is easy-ish to grow, store and feed out. Another good plant is pumpkins, and our animals love it. Winter squashes are another really great veggie that does well despite most attempts to kill it. It’s very easy to store and will last a long time in proper conditions. Another good option is putting your animals in your gardens after harvest. They can get all the left over yummies in there and clear your garden at the same time.

Microgreens/ Sprouts

This one can get very in depth and long winded. But to give you the highlights: take a tray, add soil, add microgreen seeds (densely packed), and then soak. With proper lighting and care you can grow fodder for your chickens and even pigs and goats. The 104 Homestead has a great post on sprouting barley. The Homesteading RD also has a great post on the different microgreens and the process of growing them. Just make sure that your animals can eat the greens. Rainbow Heirloom Seed Co. has some great seeds on Amazon.

What kind and how much to feed? Honestly, we are just starting out with our microgreens and there just isn’t that much information out there on feeding microgreens to livestock. But I will say this, we are growing greens that they can eat the plant or seed of. So if goats can eat broccoli we will feed them half a tray of broccoli microgreens and see what happens. I’ll post more when we know more or find more research of it.

Buy In Bulk

Buying bulk depends completely on two things; your ability to load/unload and your ability to store. When I talk about buying in bulk, I’m talking about half ton totes like these. We have neither the ability to unload or store, so buying in bulk isn’t really a good option for us per se. But we do get a discount on how many pounds of feed we buy at a time. At our feed store if we buy a total of 500# of feed, we get a discount on all of the feed. It doesn’t matter if it’s pig, chicken and goat. I can move and store 10 50# bags of feed, I cannot do that with a ton of pig, a ton of chicken and a ton of goat feed.

What do you need to load/unload and store? Dolly’s to start if you are planning to store in 55gal drums. But if you are buying those big 1 ton totes? You’ll need pallets, pallet jack, and probably a tractor to get it off the delivery truck. There are places that you can go and fill 55 gallon drums but you have to find them first.

Another caveat to this is to shop around. While I absolutely adore Tractor Supply, I cannot afford $25-30 for a 50# bag of chicken feed. Not when I can get a better quality for half the price at my feed store. So ask other homesteaders/farmers in your area where they go for feed.

The other thing that buying in bulk helps with is reducing the amount of feed bags laying around your garage….. Not that I have that problem.

Reduce Your Animal Numbers

No one wants to talk about this, and for good reason. I don’t want to cull, sell or give away any of my animals. On our homestead we can’t keep around animals simply because they are cute. If an animal doesn’t have a purpose, they don’t stay on the farm. The best way to save money on feed is to not have so many animals to feed. It’s just the cold hard truth. If you are trying to reduce your spending, buying feed from the feed store isn’t going to reduce your spending.

If you are having trouble choosing who needs to go, ask your self this: who is the oldest? Who is the meanest? Who is the fattest? Who is the hardest to handle? This should start to help you narrow it down a bit. Again, while not ideal and it breaks my heart, I know who is on the chopping block if we ever get to that point.

Saving Money On Livestock Feed

There are a million different ways to feed your animals. But at the end of the day, feed is an expense that you need to be okay with. If you’re not, then you need to reconsider the amount and type of animals you are getting. Meat chickens require tons of feed but pigs can be maintained on kitchen scraps and good pasture. It’s all in how you want to raise your animals.

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Welcoming American Guinea Hogs To The Homestead

November 21, 2022 by Leigh Leave a Comment

About a month ago, we welcomed Bacon and Delilah to the homestead. We had talked about wanting to get pigs when we started the homestead, but I never really put a lot of thought into it. After a ton of research and a swift kick in the pants while at The Homesteaders of America Conference? We picked up two American Guinea Hogs.

Why We Chose The American Guinea Hog

When we started looking at adding pigs to the homestead, there were quite a few concerns that I had about pigs. I was told that they are mean, bite, root, escape and eat a ton of food. The trade off was that if you could keep them contained and fed for six months, you would have a pig at market weight. Well, I’ve got some problems with that.

Mean/ Biting

While I don’t normally mind animals that are…. difficult, I do have a problem when they are large animals that are potentially deadly. I’m not saying that pigs are deadly. But I am saying that aggressive animals have no place on our homestead…. except Blu….and Bella.

After doing a ton of research we were really leaning towards the Berkshires, Duroc and Kune Kune. These breeds have great personalities and are rarely aggressive. Plus they are heritage breeds which is really important to me.

Rooting

Another issue with pigs is the damage they can cause to the soil. Our soil is extremely compacted with red clay under it all. But the top? It’s all sand. We want SOME rooting to help break the soil barriers so that more organic material gets mixed up in the soil. But we don’t want them to root so much that the soil biome is ruined. Or worse, stay in one area so long that they compact it with wallowing. Also, I was wanting a pig that would graze more than root. But since I don’t have pasture or grass yet, I need them to root.

This is getting to be a tall order for pig breeds.

Escaping

When looking at various breeds and watching many videos, we learned that pigs are incredibly smart. They are also more than willing to use their brute strength to break down fences. The only one that wasn’t going to constantly try and break free was the Kune Kune. But the Kune takes a long time to reach market weight, like 14+ months. This is getting harder and harder to pick a breed.

Feed Bill

The faster you want your pig to reach market weight, the more they are going to eat. The problem is, I don’t want to buy any more feed than I have to. The Duroc will reach market weight in five months, but to do that, we would have to give it grower feed, which is expensive. I talked about the real cost of raising livestock here. I’ve already got a $600/mo feed bill. Let’s not add to that.

I really wanted a grazing pig that would eat table scraps and left overs but ultimately would eat grass if we didn’t have scraps to give them.

Enter The American Guinea Hogs

The American Guinea Hogs are amazing pigs and up until about 75 years ago, it was a staple animal on almost every single farm in the US. But with the rise of super markets and city living, they fell out of favor. In fact, up till recently, there were only about 100 on in the country.

American Guinea Hogs are grazing pigs that will get bigger than the Kune and do it faster. But AGHs are a small heritage breed of pig. That means that it’s not going to be one of the monsters that will yield hundreds of pounds of pork. But that’s okay. Because they are smaller, it makes raising and butchering a lot easier.

Bacon is extremely friendly, needing to have all the snuggles and scratches. If I come outside, he is at the gate grunting at me to come snuggle and scratch. Delilah is a little stand-offish but she is coming around. The good part about that is that they come when they are called. There have been a few rainy days here and the solar chargers have run out of juice. If they slip the fence, it’s not a big deal. I simply call them and they come running, no food needed.

Another great thing about the AGH is that I have bought two bags of feed in the six weeks they have been here. Between the table scraps and fermentation, they haven’t even eaten a whole bag yet!

American Guinea Hogs Care

So what do you need to care for American Guinea Hogs? Not much if you already have livestock. We have been soaking and fermenting everyone’s feed, so we needed a few 5 gallon buckets. We already had feed buckets to bring them feed so no added expense there. We also bought a couple of Premier 1 fences with a solar charger. I mentioned above that our other charger ran out of juice, I suggest highly getting the one linked above. It doesn’t run out of juice! We just bought ours and it’s been amazing.

You do need to make sure you have some sort of a shelter. Right now, they are in our old kidding shed and that is working out very well. If they out grow it, we will look for something else but for right now, it’s good. They can handle lower temperatures as long as they are dry and have deep bedding.

Our AGHs are doing great and I absolutely love them. Butchering day is going to be brutal but at least I know they had the best life possible.

How To Keep Livestock Warm In Winter

November 7, 2022 by Leigh 1 Comment

As I write this post, it is 11/7/22 and it is 83* outside. While we live in a pretty mild winter climate here in Georgia, we do have some pretty cool/ cold weather. We’re not talking about -50 temperatures here. But we, and our animals, are not used to severe winter weather. No matter where you live, when it comes to taking care of livestock in the winter, there are a lot of things that you can do to help keep livestock warm in winter.

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Keeping Livestock Warm

There are a lot of different variables to consider before you just dump a load of pine shavings into their shelter and call it a day. You need to consider your climate, animals, and resources before you just start throwing options out there to see what sticks. If you live in an area that rains a lot but doesn’t get too cold, you may not need to worry so much about deep litter bedding and may need to focus more on where the shelter is located. If you live in a snow drift, maybe having a good barn or deep litter is the right way for you.

I’m going to go through all the considerations that you should consider before you pick a method. At the bottom of this post, I’ll go through all the different methods you can use to help keep your livestock warm in winter.

Climate

Depending on where you live will ultimately depend on how much you have to do to keep them warm. If you live in the far north, you may need deep bedding, water bucket warmers, and draft free shelters. In the south, you can get away with a three sided shelter and hammer to break ice.

We live in the Northeast Georgia Mountains, basically the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains. Our summers are hot and humid, but our winters are pretty mild. Occasionally, we get snow but more often than not we get ice storms. Our winters tend to be very wet, too. That being said, we don’t REALLY need to operate with a deep litter method but we do anyways. Mainly because I want the compost I get out of it…. And my animals are spoiled.

Animals

Something that you need to consider is that the vast majority of animals do not require all the things we think they do when it comes to keeping them warm. They have great winter coats that will keep them nice and toasty warm. I talked in depth about body condition of goats in this post, but I want to further that. If your animal has good body condition, a healthy coat, and good food? They don’t need coats, blankets, or other methods to keep them warm in the winter.

In fact, most livestock don’t really need anything until the temperatures are steadily below 40*. Of course this assumes that they have good body condition, aren’t sick, etc. The key here is shelter and body condition.

Resources

The resources you may need; barns/shelters, heated waterers, pine shavings, etc are really all going to depend on what methods you decide work for you and your animals. Because not one size will fit all when it comes to your herd.

Methods To Keep Livestock Warm

Before you go dump resources, let’s talk about some situations and options.

You live in Illinois. Your average winter is 36in of snow fall and 27*. If you have one goat, one pig and a couple of chickens. You are probably going to want to consider a barn and the deep litter method. But if you’ve got 5 pigs and a couple of chickens, you could feasibly just have a good layer of straw or pine shavings and a 3 sided shelter.

You live in Maine. Your average snow fall is about 20ish inches and temperature is roughly 3*. But you live on the coast and it’s windy. You probably need a barn if you only have a few animals. If you have multiple of the same species, you could get away with only having a three sided structure.

Why? Well, when you have multiple of the same species, they will cuddle together to stay warm. If you only have a few of each kind, they may not snuggle up and that can cause their body temperatures to drop.

Finally, you live in Georgia. Your average snow fall is 1in a year (if your lucky) and temperature is 40*. But it’s Georgia so you may end up in a freak hurricane, tornado and snow storm in the same week. You’ve got one of a couple different types of animals. You could get away with a dog igloo and some straw. Literally. It doesn’t matter if you have 100 animals. Get more dog igloos. It’ll be cheaper.

Things You Can Do To Keep Them Warm

Deep Litter– This is probably my favorite during the winter but most hated chore in the spring. With a deep litter method, you pretty much dump a new bag of pine shavings or straw on top of the old bedding. Some people will spot clean the urine and feces, but we don’t. As the shavings, feces and urine break down (compost), it will create more heat for the goats. This method works well for us because we don’t have to worry as much if a goat gets “left out” by the other goats. Unfortunately, come spring, this is a monster chore.

Heaters– I’m not a fan of heaters in a barn because of the fire hazard. BUT sometimes they are necessary. Whether it’s small kids, piglets, or a really cold night, you do what you gotta do. I really like this one. The fire hazard is greatly reduced. Another option is to have all of your animals together in a barn. They can have their own separate areas but the more animals together, the more heat they will all produce.

Feed– This is a big one for ruminants, but all mammals create heat by digesting food. That being said, during the summer we don’t keep food in the barn. In the winter, they get a full bag of hay every night. If they eat it, they stay warm. If they spill it? They still stay warm with the bedding. Our animals have pretty much unlimited access to food during winter. While that may seem counter productive, especially when feed may be hard to come by, it will help ensure they survive the winter.

The Hay Calculator:

If you aren’t math-y (don’t worry I’m not either), check out our Hay Calculator. It literally does ALL of the math for you and gives you totals based on what you want your goals.

On the second page, you can track where you’ve bought hay, what you spent and how long it lasted.

Buy the Hay Calculator

Drafts/ Wind– If you are putting them in a three sided shelter, make sure that the wind can’t get in. Since most winter winds come from the north, make sure to face the opening to the south. But make sure to check your area and see which direction the wind comes from. For drafts, this is similar to the winds, but a little different. We want airflow in the barn but not so much that it creates cold spots that the animals have to heat up. The best way to do this is to have south opening “vents”. On our barn, we just cut the T1-11 so that top was open on the south side.

Reducing Moisture– Hypothermia is a thing. We learned in childhood that after a day of playing in the snow, we needed to come inside, take off our wet clothes and get warmed up. Well, it’s similar with livestock, except they can’t take off their clothes. We want to keep moisture reduced as much as possible. To do this, we make sure roofs don’t leak, rain can’t come in, and the ground is dry. The deep litter method can come in here because you can add bedding to the areas that are wet to help absorb them.

Maintaining Good Body Condition– I cannot stress this enough! If you are growing animals for meat, or you’ve got pregnant or lactating animals, you HAVE TO maintain good body condition. If your animal does not have good body condition going into winter, they will not be able to stay warm. We almost lost Champ this past winter due to poor body condition AND being pregnant. Everything she ate went to keeping herself warm and her babies alive. Thankfully, everyone pulled through (except two still born kids). This year we have been on top of their feed and body conditions and hopefully, this won’t be a problem. If you are raising meat animals, it’s the same thing, if they are not fed enough they will lose their conditioning and they will eat to stay warm vs eat to get to market weight.

Heading Into Winter

Winter is a time to sit back, relax and enjoy your bounty from the year. It’s also a time for planning for next year. There are chores to do, but as a whole winter is a resting season. If you can prepare now, before it’s too cold, you will find yourself and your animals will be able to rest as well.

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2023: Infrastructure And Self Reliance

October 26, 2022 by Leigh Leave a Comment

When Jared and I sat down to go over our infrastructure for 2023; the projects, plans, and goals, we really wanted to get us to a place were the projects were done. That way we could focus our finances in other areas. Now, we all know that projects on the homestead are never truly done. But if we can get some of these bigger projects out of the way? We will be well on our way to self reliance and that is huge.

What Does Self Reliance Look Like To Us

The best way to set up goals is to ask yourself some questions. Like WHY do you want to be self reliant? What does self reliance look like to you? How are you going to become self reliant? These questions will have answers, but more often than not, they lead to more questions. But to give you our starting off point, we see self reliance as a way to decrease spending, reduce off farm hours, and create a eco-system here on the farm.

The more we become self reliant, the less we will spend at the feed and grocery store. The less money we spend at the grocery and feed store, the quicker we can pay off the farm and any debt we have. The quicker we pay off our debts, the more we can reduce off farm hours. If we can create an eco-system where our garden and land feed our livestock, and we can harvest our garden and livestock. Then we will be back to reducing our need for the feed and grocery store.

This symbiotic relationship with our land and livestock are paramount in not only becoming self reliant, but being good stewards to our land and shepherds to our herds.

Setting Up Our Infrastructure

As I’m sure you can tell, Self Reliance is the keyword for our lives for the next few years. It is the cornerstone of every single thing we are doing and planning. So we are starting the first year with infrastructure. I talked in depth about what infrastructure is in this blog post. But the point of that post was to get you to think about your own infrastructure and what that means for your homestead.

When it comes to our homestead, we are really trying to focus on self reliance. Keeping in mind that the 3 big dreams are spending less money, reducing off farm hours, and creating an eco-system are the most important things. We created our infrastructure list and plans around that.

The goal of 2023 is to set up the homestead with those three big dreams in mind. For example: we have made the hard decision that if we can’t sell our bucklings, they will become meat goats. We’ve also made the decision that we will no longer buy chickens because we like the way they look, or how many eggs they lay. All chickens will be a meat variety instead of dual purpose. The gardens are going to go be overhauled into a “bulk garden” and a “kitchen” garden. We are going to start working on water movement so that we are no longer laying hoses throughout the property to get water to animals and gardens.

Meat

Then there’s closing the holes in our food security. One of the things we decided was to focus on heritage breeds. While they take more time to mature, they are more efficient with what they eat. We recently purchased 2 American Guinea Hogs so that we can stop relying on other farms for our pork. We are also going to be purchasing several Bourbon Red turkeys to further reduce our dependance on the grocery store or other farms.

The caveat to these animals is that we are also only going to buy animals that can work as well. One of the things that we learned at the HOA conference in Virginia, was that the animals should work for you too. Pasture rotation is a thing we knew about, but when listening to the lectures, we learned about what pigs can do for revitalizing the soil.

Gardens

Our gardens are going to look very different then they did last year. We are going to bring the pigs and chickens into our side yard and allow them to root, scratch and poop on that area and will turn it into another garden. That garden will hold all of our squash, cucumber, melon, herbs, etc. Then we will turn our old garden into the “bulk” garden for corn, tomatoes, peppers and food for the animals.

We are making lists of what we buy at the grocery store and of that, what can we grow? One of the things we can grow to spend less money growing cumin. We use a TON of cumin and at $20 a container, that’s a lot of money every year. It’s the same thing with lettuces. We feed our bearded dragons mustard, turnip, collard greens. At $4 a bag, and we by 4 bags a month? That’s a huge savings if we grow those things ourselves. Not to mention, that the pigs will eat the excess turnips.

Animals

We already discussed the hogs, turkeys and chickens. But to go a little more in depth, every single animal on our homestead is going to have a purpose. And if they require additional feed that the farm can’t produce? That is something we need to look at or they aren’t going to stay long. This has led to some hard decisions when it comes to our personal animals.

We aren’t going to just get rid of them. But this thought process has shown us the amount of money spent on the dogs, cats, dragons and snakes for pleasure, hurts our bottom line of spending less. That means 1) no new animal will be brought to the homestead unless it serves a purpose and the farm can sustain it. And 2) has made us really look into how we can feed animals alternatively without affecting their health.

Another point with the animals is keeping around animals that are not producing. The animal lover in me struggles with the idea of just butchering an animal because it is no longer useful. But the homesteader in me says, but that’s their job. It’s very conflicting and confusing.

Permaculture And Self Reliance

This word has been rattling around my head for the better part of a month. One of the things we have been talking about pre-conference was that while we could afford our $600/mo feed bill, we didn’t want to. After the conference, we realized that we could grow most of the food our animals need without having to use as much feed. This lead us to the idea of permaculture.

The plan, and resulting infrastructure, is that we are going to use electric netting to rotate the pigs and chickens throughout the property. We’ve had a lot of predator problems with our chickens and we are hoping that by giving them a safe space, with electrified netting, this will keep the predators down. For the pigs, we are planning on giving them a large space to root and poop in hopes that they will break the soil and allow the good things to get into the soil. After they have worked the soil in that area, we will move them to the next area and let them continue through the property.

While I love my compost, and we will always have and use it, the idea of schlepping wheelbarrows up hill and all over the property is not my idea of a good time. BUT I can take bedding waste, wasted hay, and other compostables and just put it in where the chickens are. They can spread it around and the soil can break it down there.

Another part of permaculture is instead of ripping out gardens when they are done, we can put the pigs, chickens or goats in there and let them “rip out” the garden. This will reduce our work load, feed them, and put them to work. That seems like a win to me.

Bringing Self Reliance Into The House

While at the HOA conference, we were told that the house is not as important as the land. I, wholeheartedly, disagree. While the personal how’s and why’s of that is not important, what is important is that having a safe, secure, and comfortable home, is just as important as the land. And yes, part of it is vanity on my end. While I don’t want the best of the best and need designer things. I do need my home to be safe, secure, and comfortable.

We have to update our electrical panel, breakers, and some wiring. We need to take down some trees that would absolutely demolish our home if they fell. Then there’s the fire safety aspect of putting in tile accents in front of the fire place. We have to paint the exterior of our home because cedar siding will be damaged if it is not taken care of property. Oh, and our back deck is about to fall of the house. So while yes, the land is important so is the house.

I understand what these other homesteaders were talking about in regards to making sure that the land is the priority. But at the same time, so is the home. I know that they don’t mean, “Don’t worry about the electrical panel! You need to put pasture rotation into effect first.” But at the same time, me being comfortable in my home is equally as important as the land. And to be honest, we can do both.

The Food Storage Room

One of the other ways we are going to work on our self reliance is to finish up our food storage room. While most will call this a pantry, it’s going to be much more than that. In this storage room, we will have all of our canned goods, garden harvests, coffees, etc. It will also have a dehumidifier and vents on a thermometer to help control the temperatures. It will be insulated and have a door to keep animals out. We will also be storing our crockpots, stock pots, and other larger kitchen appliances in there so that we can reduce the amount of space they take up in the kitchen.

So I will be working on making the house comfortable for my family, while Jared is out there cutting down trees and replacing the electrical panel. I may even help him paint the house.

What Is Your Self Reliance Infrastructure

At the end of the day, you have to do what is right for your family, your land and your animals. It’s not about them or me. It’s about you and what you are trying to accomplish with your life. I hope this post has opened your eyes to what you want to do with your homestead.