Goats

How To Keep Livestock Warm In Winter

December 3, 2024 by Leigh Leave a Comment

As I write this post, it is 12/2/2024 and it is 75* 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. Instead, we have hot/humid summers. 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.

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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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

Where you live will ultimately depend on how much you have to do to keep livestock 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.

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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 or rain, 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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How Much Grain To Give Your Goats

November 30, 2024 by Leigh Leave a Comment

This advice does not replace that of a Veterinarian! Please consult with your Vet if you have ANY questions about this post, what to feed or how to feed your animals!

Goats can live a very happy and comfortable life with no hay, grain, alfalfa, beet pulp or other feed from humans. BUT you better live in an area where they have 24/7/365 days of green browse to eat. It’s one of those sayings, “Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.” And that is exactly why I wanted to give you a rough estimate of how much grain to give goats. But also some other things to increase their body condition.

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When to Start Adding Commercial Grains

There are several situations in which I would consider adding commercial grains to your feed rations and I will explain each one in depth.

Body Condition– This is the most important in my opinion. If you have a goat that is thin, the first thing you need to do is get a fecal to make sure that their skinny-ness isn’t due to a high parasite load. A visit to the vet could also be in order to make sure they don’t have an illness that would keep them from gaining weight. Regardless, they need more groceries. But you want to make sure that you take care of any parasites that are stealing the nutrition or start a treatment on the goat so they can uptake those nutrients properly. You can find my post about body condition here.
Reduced Browse– Goats love to eat browse and will travel far and wide for it. At least until it runs out. Or unless they are spoiled rotten like our girls. Then they want their morning grain, afternoon grain and evening grain.
Pregnant or Lactating Does– Much like human women, pregnant does need more food to make sure that they not only maintain good body condition, but also ensure the kids are getting enough milk to stay healthy.
Winter– If you live in an area that actually has seasons, winter can be harsh for your goats. Unless you are getting good quality hay, they are going to struggle to get enough nutrition from hay alone. So making sure they have quality feed is a great option.

What Kind Of Grain To Give Goats

As much as I want this answer to be cut and dry, and to provide you a link, that’s just not the case. First and foremost, this is solely based on your area and your goats. For us, we use Tucker Milling Dairy Goat in the pink bag. BUT if you don’t live in the southeast, you’re going to have a hard time finding that. So what can you do? Read the label.

You are looking for a grain that has ammonium chloride to help prevent and break up urinary calculi if you are going to give your bucks and wethers grain.

You also need to make sure that it is balanced with the right calcium to phosphorus ratio of 2:1 to 4:1 (C:P). To give you an example of what you are looking for check out the photo below.

If you read the ingredients, you will see that it’s got a bunch of good minerals, ammonium chloride and a C:P of about 2:1 to 4:1. This is a decent to good feed. The protein is a little low for dairy or meat goats but not absolutely terrible. We will feed this feed if our regular feed store ran out of our normal feed.

This feed, isn’t really that great. The C:P is about 1: .6. I was unable to see if it had ammonium chloride, the copper is a little low, the C:P isn’t great either.

But don’t fear! There are things you can do to increase your calcium and protein so that you can get a better mix for healthier goats.

Fixing Commercial Feeds

Sometimes, we just have to make do with what we can find. Whether that is financially because feed is freaking expensive, or supply issues. So what can you do? You can mix your own feeds without going broke. Here’s the jist:

Say you can only find the second bag of feed. One way to raise the C:P is to add in Alfalfa Pellets. Adding in an equal scoop of alfalfa pellets will put you somewhere around 3:1 to 4:1. You can also add in a SMALL amount of beet pulp.

Another thing that you may find is that your feed has too much calcium which is equally as bad, though for different reasons. The biggest being abnormal bone growth and throw their electrolytes out of whack. To fix feed that is too high in calcium is add in small amounts of barley, oats or BOSS (black oil sunflower seeds).

So How Much Grain To Give Your Goats?

If you look back on my post about How Much Hay Does Your Goat Need, you’ll see that I said about 2-4% of their body weight per day. Well, goats don’t need that much grain. In fact, that could probably kill them. BUT a good rule of thumb to get started is about 1# of grain per day. Now that being said, don’t just start giving your goat a pound of grain every day. They will scour (diarrhea). The best thing to do is give them a handful to start and slowly work your way up.

Be warned, once you start giving them grain, they will think they are starving to death if you don’t give them the amount THEY want. Stay strong, they don’t need an entire bag, despite what they say.

The Grain Ration We Give To Our Goats

Regardless of the reason we are giving grain to our goats, the ration looks something like this:

3 quarts of Tucker Milling Dairy Goat Feed (pink bag)

1# Black Oil Sunflower Seeds

.5# Beet Pulp (dry)

This gets put into a 5gal bucket and fermented. Most of the time we top dress with the BOSS so that they don’t sprout while in the water. Sometimes they do and it’s not a big deal.

They also have almost free choice of alfalfa pellets and Bermuda/ fescue hay.

They also get free choice goat minerals.

Most Important Takeaways

Calcium to Phosphorus ratio MUST be at least 2:1 to 4:1.
Bucks and wethers CAN have grain IF the calcium to phosphorus ratios are at least 2:1 to 4:1. Bucks are more prone to Urinary Calculi due to having a smaller urinary tract. It is usually caused by too much phosphate salts in the urine.
Balanced over time is okay as long as you are making sure to actually keep it balanced over time.
Invest in good scoops! This weight scoop is fantastic for making sure that you are not over doing feed. These scoops are practically indestructible. I mean obviously they can break, but ours haven’t yet and it’s been over a year.
Grain is great but too much is bad. So make sure you are paying attention to your animals.

Find a local feed store! We save SO much money every month by going to a local feed store than a large chain store. The average bag of feed is usually $15/ 50# bag vs $25/50# from TSC. That’s chicken and goat feeds. When we buying about 25 bags of feed a month, that’s a lot of money.

How much grain do you feed your goats?

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Why Is My Goat So Skinny

November 23, 2024 by Leigh Leave a Comment

When you have been raised around dogs and cats, you know when they are a little….chunky and you know when they are too skinny. But what happens when you are new to goats and have absolutely no idea what a goat should look like? Are you asking yourself why is my goat so skinny? Let’s talk about how to judge the body condition of a goat.

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Why Is My Goat So Skinny?

If you are new to the world of livestock, this is a very common question. If you have never had a ruminant, you will ask yourself this question 9283947239487239 times in the first year. The biggest thing you have to remember is that the body condition of cows, sheep and goats are totally different than a dog or cat. And if you’re anything like my family, the way we show our animals love is to feed them….a lot.

Champion

When we first got Champ, we noticed that she seemed a little skinny. Nothing terrible, but we didn’t know a whole lot about goats. From September through November, we realized that her body condition wasn’t fantastic, but she was eating and happy. Then in December through February, we got really excited because she was starting to get pretty chunky. We were over the moon because she was so thin when we went into winter, we were worried she may not have enough fat stores. Come March, we realized we had a really big problem.

She Wasn’t Chunky, She Was Pregnant

As someone who takes pride in my knowledge of animals, it was absolutely shocking when we figured out that she wasn’t chunky, she was pregnant. All that weight we thought she was gaining, turned out to be babies. When the babies dropped, we discovered that she was skin and bones. I felt terrible. We were told via the Vet and ultrasound, that she wasn’t pregnant. So we didn’t increase her feed. She had access to quality hay and occasionally grain, but nothing else. My poor girl had almost zero fat stores.

You can see her spine, the hollow between her rib and hips. Her body condition was about a 1.5-2.0

I recently uploaded this podcast about her death.

While I am incredibly grateful that she pulled through, it was really close. I refuse to allow any animal of mine to suffer due to my lack of education. We had already lost enough animals to that. I started devouring all the information on grain, pelleted grasses, hays, and other feeds that I could get my hands on. But one thing that “eluded” me was how to tell if your goat is fat or skinny.

Livestock Are Not Like Pets

Chances are, you have had a dog or a cat. When they are skinny, you can tell pretty easily. Same thing if they are carrying a little extra weight. And it’s almost always seen in their waist first. With livestock, specifically ruminants, that is not the case.

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Because of how a ruminants abdomen is set up, they don’t necessarily have a true waist like a dog. So to use that as a determining factor isn’t really going to work. Instead, you need to FEEL their “fat pads”. What that means is that you cannot correctly and adequately judge the body condition of a goat based solely on the way they look.

If you heard someone say “That animal has a little too much condition” and you were totally confused what they meant? They are saying that animal has too much fat. Sorry.

So What Is Body Condition Of A Goat

Body condition is simply the fat covering the body of an animal. The reason that this is so important is because it gives the farmer the ability to judge how much energy/fat reserves the animal has. The good thing is that there is a scale that you can use to figure out what body condition your animal has, and what you can do about it.

Areas To Check

There are three areas that you want feel on your goat. It’s important to remember that you are not trying to feel the bone, instead you are gently pressing to feel the layer of fat between the bone and the skin. It can take some practice. When going through the scale below, remember that pressure is minimal. If you are using a lot of pressure, you will not feel the fat layer. You will only feel the bone. If you think your goat is a 5.0, you are still not cramming down on the bony areas you are feeling. It’s still small amounts of pressure because what you are trying to feeling for that fat pad.

Spine- You should feel the bony ridge on either side of the spine (technically it’s all the spine)
Ribs- You should feel the space in between the ribs
Sternum- You should feel the plate between the front legs on the chest

The Body Condition Scale

The biggest thing to remember is that this scale is a management tool just like the FAMACHA score cards. It is not an end all be all. Nor can you simply say, she’s skinny and needs more groceries. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work like that, and I explain more below.

The scale starts at 1.0 and goes to 5.0 and goes up in .5 increments. Where do you want your goat to live on the scale? We like our goats between 3.0 to 4.0. But depending on the circumstances we are okay with a 2.5.

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What Is The Scale?

1.0– Goat is going to be absolutely no fat on ANY of the three areas you check. You can see and feel the individual bones of the spine, spaces between ribs, and chest plate. These goats are extremely sick and unless turned around quickly, are probably going to die. Common causes is going to be poor husbandry, malnutrition, parasites and possibly diseases.

2.0-This goat has little to no fat along the spine. You can see ribs and there is some fat between the ribs but not a lot. Like a 1.0, there is a noticeable hollow between the hip bones and ribs.

3.0– Goats at a 3.0 should have a visible ridge on their spine but when it’s touched, there should be little give with the fat. You should be able to barely feel the ribs and should not be able to feel in between the ribs without some pressure. The chest plate should be padded.

4.0– This goat should be a chunk. You should not be able to see the top ridge of the spine and when you feel it, should not be able to feel without a fair amount of pressure. There should be no discernable difference in the ribs without considerable pressure. The fat on the chest plate should move.

5.0– This is a super chunk. This goat needs LESS groceries, despite what it tells you. There is absolutely no way to visibly decern the spine, ribs or chest plate. When you feel, you will not feel bones without A LOT of pressure.

What To Do With The Information From The Scale

I know, it’s a lot to unpack, but stick with me here. Above I said that the body condition score and the FAMACHA score are management tools, right? Ok, this is why it’s a management tool.

If you have a goat that is a 1.0-2.0, they are pretty thin and need to be evaluated for parasites, disease, pregnancy and husbandry. Remember, I screwed up husbandry, too, so don’t get upset here. But we need to figure out why. If the fecal is clear and you or your vet can’t find a reason for the goat to be skinny, give it some more food. Start small and go from there. If the fecal isn’t clear, start a worming protocol that you find effective. Don’t have a worming protocol? Talk to a vet. If you don’t have a Caprine vet, get on Facebook and go to Goat Emergency Team or Successful Goating With Rosie. I swear those two groups have saved my goats more often than I care to admit.

If you have a 3.0-4.0, keep doing what you’re doing but monitor closely for changes. Do they gain weight? Back off the feed. If they lose weight, get a fecal and up the feed.

5.0? Back off the groceries but also check for pregnancy for does. Bucks are almost always a feed issue, but could be something else.

But if you have a goat that has clear fecals, good FAMACHA, no illness, no pregnancy, but you can’t get it to gain weight? You may just have a thin goat. Monitor this goat closely for rapid declines. Champ is a thin goat. We can get her to a 3.0 and she will slide back to a 2.0-2.5 for no reason. Her fecals are clear, FAMACHA is good, and vet clears her health wise. We just roll with it and keep an eye on her. Not that she would let us ignore her. EVER.

Why Is My Goat So Skinny?

There are a lot of reasons for your goat to be skinny. My first question is always, is she really skinny? If you are brand new to goats, you may think she’s skinny and she’s perfectly fine. Use the chart above to figure out if she’s skinny or just right.

Our herd health bundle helps you keep track of your herd’s health. Includes the goat assessment, herd check sheets AND Herd Health Tracker!

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Another reason your goat may be skinny is a high parasite load. Most vets can run a fecal for around $25, depending on your area. Or you can reach out to an independent lab. Meadow Mist is a great one. Last I heard, they do their fecals for $6 each. If they have a high parasite load, treat and then revaluate.

Lastly, she could be pregnant or sick. If you can, have her evaluated by a vet to rule out any possible illnesses. If she was possibly bred, have a pregnancy test done. She may not be getting enough to sustain her and the babies.

I hope this helps you figure out what to do in terms of management with your goats. Goats try to un-alive themselves constantly. So staying on top of their care is really important.

Don’t forget to check out the crash course below

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Goat Milk Coffee Creamer

November 9, 2024 by Leigh Leave a Comment

Jump to Recipe

When life hands you lemons, you are supposed to make lemonade. Well, I did that yesterday. Today, well today there was a mishap in the freezer. Instead of letting it get the best of me, I decided to get a project done that I have been meaning to do, but never had the time…. Today was the day I was going to make a batch of goat milk coffee creamer, whether I wanted to or not.

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They say you shouldn’t cry over spilled milk

I don’t know who “They” are but I almost cried today when I went to put up two half gallon mason jars of goat milk. When I looked in our freezer, I saw that two jars had burst and I felt tangible pain. I started checking over my other jars and sure enough twelve half gallon mason jars were broken. I had a decision to make, either leave them in there and deal with each jar as we pulled them out to use it. Or fix it now while I had the chance. I’m not one to kick the can down the road, so I grabbed a milk crate and brought all twelve jars upstairs.

Finally after almost six hours, I finally had all of the milk melted, jars thrown away, and all twelve jars triple strained. I wanted to cry every time I found a glass shard, but this is precious milk. This is the only milk I can drink without stomach issues and when we have to help bottle feed, this is the milk we use. Not to mention, the only way I can get more is by breeding goats, and then waiting six months.

After everything was all said and done, I had managed to salvage all the milk except a few drops, only to run out of freezer bags. **facepalm** This is my life.

Now, I am not 100% sure what caused the jar failure. I have frozen mason jars for years and never had an issue. If I had to guess, I would say either a head space problem or half gallon mason jars shouldn’t be frozen. It doesn’t really matter since I won’t do it again, but it would be nice to know for the future.

Anyways, the whole point is I have one and a half gallons of goat milk that I need to do something with. I could refreeze them, and I may still. But right now, I am making coffee creamer. I may even try my hand at making cheese so stay tuned.

How to make Goat Milk Coffee Creamer

I’m going to start this with saying this, you do NOT need goat milk to make your own creamer. Any milk will work. However, since I have goats and gut issues, I use goat milk.

Using a 1:1 ratio whisk your milk and condensed milk into a thick bottomed sauce pot. You can make your own condensed milk by adding about 2/3c sugar to 2c of milk. Stir until sugar is dissolved and then let simmer for about 30 minutes without stirring on low heat.

Allow it to heat for a few minutes to mix really well. If you are going to use any flavorings now is the time to add them. I’ll go over my flavorings below.

Pour into your creamer vessel, I use these if it’s going in the fridge, or old creamer containers if going into the freezer.

Allow to cool. Then store in either fridge or freezer.

That’s it! You don’t have to be some wizard to make creamer. If you don’t like “Foo Foo” creamer, just whisk your milk an condensed milk together. Done.

When you are ready to drink it, make sure to shake really well first.

Peppermint Mocha on the Left and Cinnamon Cake on the right

Flavorings

All flavorings are based on a quart, so adjust your recipe as needed. Also start with small amounts and then add more if you want. It’s harder to take away than to add more.

Peppermint Mocha

1T cocoa powder 1t peppermint extract (be careful with peppermint extract, it tends to taste very oily)

Cinnamon Cake

1T cinnamon, 1t butter extract, 1t cake batter flavoring

Banana Nut Bread

1t cinnamon, 1t butter extract, 1t cake batter flavoring, 1t maple syrup flavor, 1t banana flavor

Pumpkin Spice

1T Pumpkin spice flavor on this one, you can add additional cinnamon or cake batter to give it a more cake-y taste but test it first with just the pumpkin and see how you like it.

While I’m still mad about the jars breaking, I am glad that I was able to finally get around to making creamer for us. I just hate that it had to be like that. Oh, well.

Goat Milk Coffee Creamer

Print Recipe Pin Recipe

Cook Time 5

Servings: 1 Quart

Ingredients Equipment Method Notes

Ingredients

14 oz Sweetened Condensed Milk
14 Oz Milk
Flavorings

Equipment

1 Thick bottomed pot
1 Spatula
1 Whisk
1 Quart Container

Method

Pour milk into thick bottomed pot and start heating on low
Stir in condensed milk
Add any flavorings you want
Whisk together until combined. If using powdered flavorings this could take a while. Let sit for a few minutes and then whisk again. Repeat until most or all of the flavoring is dissolved
Add to quart container and allow to cool before refrigerating

Notes

You can absolutely freeze this if you have a freezer safe container.

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The Actual Cost of Raising Livestock

November 5, 2024 by Leigh Leave a Comment

Do you get “free” eggs or “free” milk? If you think it’s free, think again. Your chickens do not produce free eggs. Your goats do not produce free milk. And when you are drowning in eggs or milk, you may be tempted to just give it away. I wanted to breakdown the actual costs associated with common livestock before you get too far in debt trying to care for these creatures. So what is the actual cost of raising livestock?

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Actual Cost Of Raising Livestock

There are many variables when it comes to the cost of raising livestock. You’ve got the initial investment of the animal, then the care and upkeep of that animal. Not to mention possible vet care, feed, fencing, and replacement animals. There is so much that goes into the care and keeping of livestock that anything that you get out of them puts you solidly in the red. It takes a long time and constant vigilance to make a profit when raising livestock.

The Animal

Initially, all animals have to be brought to the homestead. Rarely, though it does happen, is livestock left behind when old owners sell and new owners buy a piece of property. We were hoping that the previous owner’s Brahma would stick around, he didn’t. But that being said, we had to bring almost every single animal onto this property. How much did that cost us?

Our goats are our most expensive creature here. We have spent about $3,000 on the goats we bought. Bebe, Stella, Finnegan, and Sébastien are the only ones we haven’t paid for since they were born here. That also doesn’t count their registration fees. That gives an average of $375 per goat. But we paid way more than that for some of them.

The chickens are by far the cheapest animal on the homestead but still pretty expensive at about $5 each. Ducks were about $10 each. The more “exotic” or heritage breeds are obviously more expensive.

Containment

This comes in a couple of different forms but the most common is fencing and housing. We were lucky enough to get our fencing installed pre-inflation. The cost of the fencing alone has almost doubled, not to mention the T posts, clips or gates. Our cost was right at $1200 for the 3 goat pastures.

Our initial coop cost us about $500 and while I really liked it, we out grew it quickly. Now, we have a metal shed that houses our chickens and ducks for the night. That set us back another $500 but effectively quadrupled our square footage.

Our goat barn is another cost that is pretty high. I think we paid about $2200 in materials for it. Unfortunately, it’s not great and is going to need to be torn down and rebuilt not only at a better location, but also bigger because we have more goats now. The cost of rebuilding is estimated at $1500.

Feed/ Supplements

This is probably the most flexible of all the costs because you may not need to buy hays, grains, and other feeds. I talked in depth about how much hay a goat needs here. But something else to consider is that it’s very difficult for animals to get their nutritional needs 100% met with browse or forage alone.

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

My feed bill is about $400-600/mo depending on the time of year and what they need. In the winter, they eat more grains and hay so the cost is closer to $600+. In the summers, I don’t have to feed as much because they have access to all the browse, forage and bugs that they could ever eat. The bucks have to stay in their pasture in the summers because they get a little too excited to see my girls. So I still have to hay them.

Supplements are another cost to consider into the actual cost of raising livestock. Goats need minerals. Chickens need extra calcium. During kidding season, I will go through a bulk pack of Tums in about a month. Then there’s the iodine, iron injections, B complexes and more. I spend about $500 every 6 months in supplements.

Vet Care/ Medications

Within the first 48 hours of having Oakley and Bailey, I had spent over $300 on them. They had gotten into mountain laurel and Bailey almost died. I also spend about $200 a year on fecals. I could do them myself but it’s easier and more time saving to have the vet do it. The vet comes out once or twice a year to do a herd health check and make sure that they are doing good. Getting 12 goats to the vet would be almost impossible. In 2021 we spent $3,000 in vet bills. In 2022, we are on par to spend $5,000. That includes the fecals, prescription medications, wormers, and other supplements.

Another thing to note when it comes to vet bills is that as you get more comfortable and confident in your care of livestock, the less you will spend in vet bills. That’s not to say that you won’t spend any money, but it does go down. We spent about $2,000 in 2023 and maybe $500 in 2024 for vet bills. Most of that is culling sickly animals and the other part of that is having a better understanding of what is happening with these animals and caring for them appropriately.

Miscellaneous Materials

I went pretty in depth in these posts about what to have on hand throughout the year.

What To Have On Hand During Kidding Season

What Do you Need to Care for Goats

How To Brood Chickens Inside

You can also check out this from Redfin article as well! “Whether you’re planning to raise chickens at home in Asheville, NC, Eugene, OR, or Burlington, VT, check out this Redfin article we were featured in on 5 Chicken Coop Ideas For A Thriving Flock“

But there is so much more.

Bedding runs us about $600 during the winter. In the summer, we just keep the barns mucked out and have them on dirt floors. But in the winters, it gets so raw and wet that it’s better for them to have some sort of bedding.

Buckets, troughs and other feeders: My initial investment was somewhere around $200 for these and I plan to have the ability to replace them every year or so, depending on if they, or the kids, wreck them.

Then we have things like hoof trimmers, syringes and needles, milk pails, glass jars for milk and cheese making supplies. We’re probably another $500 there.

So our total cost for 2022 for all of this was: about $12,000.

For 2023 we are on par to hit $20,000. The split between chickens and goats would be about $2,000 for chickens and about 18,000 for goats.

But What Do We Get Out Of It?

The Cost

The average cost of goat milk is $9/ quart in my area. Each girl gives me about a quart of milk a day so each one produces about $270/mo worth of milk. They didn’t give me any milk last year, so we’ll count the estimated $18,000. If they keep production at $270 x3 girls in milk, my milk will cost me $8,280. Yes, cost me. They don’t save me a dime. Unless we sell babies and even then, it won’t make up the $8,280.

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The chicken eggs go for about $5/dozen in my area and I get about a dozen eggs every 2-3 days. So we’ll say 2.5 days for a dozen eggs. If they keep production up for the whole year, which they should since we have different ages on different laying schedules, they will cost me $1,280 a year. They also don’t make me a dime.

So Why Do We Keep Them?

Well, the goats help clear the land and that helps keep the predator population down. If the goats can keep the brush down, it allows us to see and take care of predators. They also provide compost for the gardens. Goats are also my form of therapy. I’ve been to counseling over the years and I’m just not a fan of talking my problems out with strangers. But give me a goat? All that stress melts away. AND they’re adorable.

Chickens are probably the best cost to advantage ratio. They eat all the spiders, grubs, termites, and other nasty things. They help turn the soil in the winter and the tomatoes love their compost. If they get too old or too mean, they go to freezer camp. Plus, they give us eggs.

Beyond all of that, the animals have taught all of us patience. They’ve taught us to care for things more than ourselves. The animals have also taught compassion for our food, whether it be milk, eggs, cheese or meat. The goats have shown the boys biology lessons that they never would have gotten in the city or in public school. They’ve taught us life skills that we never would have gotten without them. And most importantly they’ve taught us about death and how to cope with it.

And that is worth more than money.

If you like the content I put out, feel free to buy us a coffee! It helps keep this site running, marketing and the goats in grain!

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Our Homestead Buying Guide

October 26, 2024 by Leigh Leave a Comment

I’ve been getting asked a lot, “Where do you buy x?” So I figured I would take the time to list out where we buy the stuff for our goats, chickens, canning, seeds, garden stuff, and other odds and ends that we have used and really like. This is a VERY link heavy post, so here is our affiliate disclosure again. It doesn’t cost you a penny, but it does help us here on the homestead. The other thing is that I am not going to push you to buy anything that we have not already bought, tested and liked/loved. You don’t need that and to be honest, that’s not who I am. Here is the Homestead Buying Guide.

The Ultimate Homesteader’s Starter Bundle – Only $47!

Get the tools you need to stay organized, track profits, and manage your homestead with ease!

Includes:
✅ Schedule F Tracker – Simplify tax prep
✅ Profit Calculator – Track earnings
✅ Hay Calculator – Plan livestock feed
✅ Garden Journal – Digital & printable
✅ Herd Health Tracker – Monitor animal care
✅ Simple Budget – Manage finances
✅ Backyard Homestead eBook – Essential tips

$99 value – now just $47! Start your homesteading journey today!

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PS: if you don’t have a Honey account and you shop online a ton, I highly suggest you download it. You can use my code here. They are great because it can automatically search for coupon codes and you earn cash back on purchases. I’ve earned $300 in the last year. It’s worth the minimal effort AND you can add items to your honey list which will tell you when prices have dropped or if it’s at the lowest price.

Livestock

Goats

You can read any of my posts involving my goats here.

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We get most of our goat gear from Tractor Supply. Their prices can be higher than a local feed store on some things but cheaper on others. For example; my local feed store has alfalfa pellets for $17.99/ 50# bag. Tractor supply has theirs for $19.99 as of this writing.

Buckets– We get these for feed, water, and so many other things. They are really useful.

Troughs- We use two different kinds. This one is the one we hang on the fence at different points to give them feed, alfalfa, or whatever else. We use this one for portability or if we are hanging a temporary feeder in a kidding pen for them.

Balling Gun– This helps us get pills down into the goats without having to worry about getting bitten. Yes, that happens a lot.

Hoof Trimmers- We’ve bought two of these, and I’m a fan of this one. It just seems sturdier and I like it better. BUT this one from TSC is fine too. It’s not that I don’t like it per se, I just prefer the orange one. If you’ve got some money to spend, I would HIGHLY suggest the Hoof Boss. I’ve seen it used and it does a fantastic job. It is on our wish list of things to buy.

Meds- Now, I’m going to say this. We treat a lot of aliments on our homestead. But we also have an amazing vet that we can call any time… almost. But having a few meds on hand is going to save you a ton of heartache. Meds to get from a vet: Thiamine, Banamine and a good antibiotic. Things to have on hand that you can get from a feed store: Red Cell, Probiotics, Safeguard or Cydectin (or your choice of dewormer), electrolytes, Iron, B-complex, and Copper Wire Bolus. On the copper wire, make sure you get kids or adults based on what you have.

Chickens

You can read about how we brood chickens here. The list below are links to the items we have bought.

Incubator- We use this one and have had great success with it. The only thing I don’t like is the size. I wish it were bigger but beggar and choosers.

Brooder lights- We have used CHE’s like this one, but it can cause the chickens to attack other chickens. So a red light and housing is what you really need. We also use pine shavings for bedding for both the goats and the chickens.

Feed- When we have chicks, we start them on a medicated feed. This helps with cocci and other harmful organisms. Remember, you really only need a week or two worth of this feed. What we do is feed approximately 1#/ chick. If you have two chicks, you would need 2#, if you have 50 you need 50#. This is not perfect, it’s really a guess. When we do our meat chickens, we buy one bag of medicated chick start and than it’s regular chick feed after that.

Feeders/waterers- We use this feeder when they are little, and this one when they are bigger. However! If you’ve got some money to spend or you are only interested in buying one thing, this is the feeder you need. I love it! AND we can hang it, which really does decrease the mess. It also works fantastic with the ducklings.

When chicks are little, they need a ton of water, but they are also extremely messy. So finding one that isn’t going to make a mess but also be easy to fill has been difficult. This waterer is good, not great, but it will get the job done when they are little. As they get bigger, we use this one. We found that the metal ones did not hold up well at all. If you have a waterer you love, let me know in the comments.

House Supplies

Canning

Alright! I’ve been waiting to do this one!

Canners- This is my water bath canner and this is my pressure canner. I’ve got two of the presto pressure canners and I love them. One of these days, I am going to get this mack daddy. I can process 19 quarts a time. Which replaces BOTH of my other canners. The price tag is steep at around $500 but it’s got a life time warranty and it’s worth every penny.

Jars- All I’m going to say is this: when you think you have enough, double it. Then double it again. Here’s why. I have over a thousand jars. When I can, I can for an entire year. So when I am figuring out how many jars of tomato sauce I need for the year, it’s not a couple dozen. I can 104+ quart jars. When I can green beans, it’s not a couple pints. It’s 146+ quarts and 146+ pints. Same with corn. Soups and stews is another big ticket item in my house. We are talking 200 quarts and 200 pints-ish. Sometimes it’s more. That’s already 600 quart jars that I need. So while you may not need that many, be prepared that you will need more than you think.

Funnels- Yall, you will never, and I mean never have enough funnels. I love the metal funnels and I have at least 6 of them. Make sure to get wide mouth and regular!

Jar grabby things- Get a bunch of these too. You will lose them or the handles will break while you are mid canning.

Books- Canning cookbooks are some of the best investments that you can make. This book is hands down the best period. Buy it. She’s got a ton of amazing soups in there and they are divine. This is another really good one with some great recipes. If you are new to canning, I will recommend getting a Ball Book. There is a ton of great information in them. BUT after you get some experience, or after doing your own research, take it with a grain of salt. Some of the recipes are extremely convoluted and contradictory. Lastly, I’m not a Prepper, per se. BUT I do put up my own food because after the pandemic, I realized that relying on the grocery store isn’t a super smart idea. That being said, this book has some great recipes, ideas, and more for being self reliant.

Check back for more items as we find them and add them to the list!

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What To Have On Hand During Kidding Season

October 12, 2024 by Leigh Leave a Comment

If you have been on this blog for more than one article, you know how much we love our goats. Seriously, it’s ridiculous. But you may not have heard about the good, bad and ugly that is kidding season. If you have never owned livestock or even had a family pet give birth, you are absolutely not prepared for what is going to happen when your animal gives birth. Even after getting a birth or two under your belt, you’re probably STILL not prepared. And if you’ve got goats? Well, nothing will go as planned during kidding season.

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Let’s Start Before Labor

If you know your goat is pregnant, or at least your pretty positive, there are somethings you should do prior to her giving birth. If you don’t have these things on hand, I highly recommend you go and get them quickly. You can buy all of this on amazon, or you can get it at your local feed store or Tractor Supply. All the links here will be for TSC because most everyone has one around somewhere.

Selenium– If you live in a selenium depleted area, which is almost the entire US, your brand new goat kid is probably deficient. However, if you have been supplementing with high quality minerals, this shouldn’t be a huge problem. We use these minerals and when kids are born, give them the selenium gel that is linked. The selenium will help boost the development of their muscles, brain and more.
Chlorohexidine or Iodine– So there is some debate about dipping umbilical cords. I am not here to set the record straight or to tell you what to do or buy. I am here to tell you what we do and why. Here’s the thing. In 2007 the DEA said no more to 7% iodine. I don’t know why, nor do I care. What I do know is that unless you have a source, you are not getting the 7% which is what is the best for dipping umbilical cords. You can read all about it here or do your own research (which I highly recommend). But the jist is this: trim the cord to about 2-3 inches so that it does not touch the ground and introduce bacteria and other nasties to your goat kid. Then dip the cord in either of the products I listed. Keep an eye on your kid and make sure that they are nursing and definitely got that colostrum.
Tums or CMPK– If labor has stalled or if your doe has milk fever, they need calcium. CMPK is what you should have on hand. But good luck finding it. Honestly, we start giving about 3-4 Tums, in the days leading up to labor and then continue to give them for a couple of days after. This to help keeps their calcium up. You do not have to by any means, but it is good to have on hand.
Ketone test strips- These can be found at your local pharmacy in the diabetic aisle. These will help you determine if you need to start treating for pregnancy toxemia. In order to keep it from happening in the first place, make sure you are feeding plenty of good quality hay and forage. If your doe is acting lethargic or otherwise off, try giving her a little molasse water and try to test her urine.
Lastly- Puppy pads, towels, exam gloves and lube. That’s really it.

I would also recommend watching as many videos on goat labor as possible. You can find Bella’s birth here. Maverick was a big boy and got stuck as he was coming out.

It’s Kidding Season!

Now, I’m pretty bougie with my goats. Unless my girls drop kids without me knowing (here’s looking at you, Bailey and Oakley), it’s a big production on my farm. I have a cheap 5 gallon bucket that has my iodine dip, towels, scissors, puppy pads, selenium and snacks for me. I will also make up some molasses water and bring them grain.

At night, our does get put in the smaller area of our barn to make sure that they have privacy from the other goats. We also have an outdoor camera in there to check in on them without disturbing them. During the day, they have free reign over the two pastures.

When it’s time for them to labor, I try to get them into the barn. I won’t force the subject, but I do prefer to have them in a protected area. Also, I will usually just hang back and watch. I get my gloves and lube ready so if I need to go in I’m not fumbling around. Then we wait.

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Don’t Panic

The best thing you can do is not panic. I know it’s easier said than done, but seriously, don’t panic. Goats have been having kids for thousands of years. The chances that they or you are going to have a traumatic birth is slim. Unless you have a Bella, then all bets are off.

Once you have decided that you are not panicking, lay your towels down and get ready. Some goats want all of your attention while in labor. Others don’t want you anywhere near them. Both are fine. I have had extremely friendly goats completely freak out on me and I’ve had total terrors turn into lovebugs during labor. The biggest thing is to keep calm and keep them calm. If that means you watch from a distance or stay snuggled in, do it.

Be On Standby

A solid 90% of goats do not require any assistance during labor. That means that you are simply on standby until you are needed. They will start pushing and grunting. If you can, look at their vulva and make sure they are making progress. They should have their kid within about 30 minutes of pushing. If not, start getting prepared to go in. You may have a stuck kid.

Stuck Kid

If after 30 minutes of pushing, she has still not produced anything. Glove up and lube up, you’re going in. What you are checking for is that you have two hooves and a nose in the birth canal. If you don’t see or feel that, you need to get in there and find it. Out of the 10% of those times that you will need to assist, it’s usually either a big kid or the head is stuck back. You need to get your hand, and maybe arm in there and pull the head forward.

Remember to stay calm. When Champ went into labor, her first and last kids where stuck. I was able to get the first one out. Then Stella came. But the 3rd one was really stuck. I ended up phoning a friend to just talk to me and keep me calm. Unfortunately, Stella is the only kid that made it. That should not be the case with your stuck kids, but it does happen.

You can read about Champ’s labor here and the resulting cuteness that is Stella.

The Kid Is Out, What Now?

The absolute first thing you do is move them out of the way IF mom is still pushing. Be careful of the umbilical cord. It will disconnect on it’s own after a few seconds of pushing. But YOU do not want to rip it.

If the kid is not breathing well, lift the kid up by their back legs and let them dangle. Gently swing them from side to side to help get any fluid that is still in their lungs, mouth and nose out.

If mom is a little busy or not immediately cleaning the kid, go ahead and start drying off the baby with a towel. With Champ, she had zero interest in her babies. I think part of it was that once she went into labor, everything was quick but she was also tired and her body condition wasn’t great.

After the kid is cleaned up, check the umbilical cord. If it has broken, make sure it is not profusely bleeding. A drop or two is fine, we are worried about massive bleeding here. Think about it this way. They are tiny, so they don’t have a ton of blood. If that blood is coming out, they don’t have much to circulate through their body. If the cord is still bleeding, pinch the cord with your fingers as hard as you can. We want to try and control the bleeding. Again, this is extremely rare and should not be a problem. Once it has stopped, you can let go and see if it start bleeding again. You can also tie off the cord with dental floss.

Dip the cord with the solution listed in your buy list above.

Bonus Tip: Sometimes, momma will not allow that solution to stay on. That is okay. Don’t panic. Bella will lick and bite off the cord if I do ANYTHING to it. Since she takes such good care of her babies, I’m not worried about it. To be honest, I don’t really dip anymore. I trim the cord to about 1-3inches and make sure they are in a clean and dry area. BUT you need to make that decision for yourself.

If mama is still pushing, let her do her thing. You can “bump” her to see if you feel another kid in there. Bumping is putting your arms under her, right in front of her udders, and pulling up sharply. You are checking to see if you feel anything hard. If so, she’s got another baby. If not, she’s passing the placenta next. It’s time to nurse if she only has one. Get her up and see if you can get the baby to nurse.

Nursing

Normally, you don’t need to help. Momma should make this happen on her own. But if you have a first time mom, or maybe a not so great momma, you could need to help the kid out.

To do this, get mama up and place the baby with it’s head towards the udders. This may take a time or two to make sure that it latches but try. If the baby or mama refuses, try again in a few minutes. Rinse and repeat. Kids need that colostrum within the first hour or two.

After the kid has nursed, I will usually get a weight on it. This helps to make sure that they are gaining weight in the coming days. If the kid is not gaining, you may have to pull the kid and start bottle feeding it.

How much weight should the kid gain? Well, that’s a question with no real answer. As long as the kid is gaining weight, is alert and being a kid, it is fine. If for any reason the kid is not gaining weight, alert or being a kid, then I would get involved.

Closing

I hope this has helped you prepare for your goat to go into labor. It can be daunting and scary. But don’t let that stop you. It is awesome to see the birth and the maternal instinct of these creatures. Plus it is heart melting to hear those first cries and mama perk up.

If you like the content I put out, feel free to buy us a coffee! It helps keep this site running, marketing and the goats in grain!

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Why You Need The Herd Health Sheets

October 8, 2024 by Leigh Leave a Comment

I posted before about how goats are not beginner livestock. I’ve also posted about the basics you need to care for your goats. But how do you keep track of all of the things that you’ve done, need to do, or want to do? I have tried many different ways of trying to keep track of who has gotten what meds, who was breed by who, and who needs vaccines or boosters. But my herd health sheets have been fantastic over the last several years and I wanted to share them with you.

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Why You Need Herd Health Sheets

Unlike other livestock, goats can be pretty fragile creatures that require constant care and maintenance. If you don’t know who is who, or maybe forget that you dewormed your milk goat, you can have some pretty serious problems. If you are using your memory to remember who got what and when, you will have problems at some point.

Here Are Some Reasons To Use Herd Health Sheets

If you are breeding your goats for milk, you need to know who bred them around what time. Then you need to know if they have had any issues with milking in the past, how often they have had to be dewormed, how many kids they throw, and if they have any contagious diseases.

Another reason to help keep track is breeding. We decided to keep Champ’s kid Stella. We CAN breed Stella back to her father but that’s not an awesome idea. Also, by knowing that Champ hates being milked, we know that we need to work with Stella a lot on the milking stand.

goat kid in the house with black dog sniffing it

We also had an issue with Orf’s within the first few months of having Bella, Champ, Midas and Texas. So by keeping track of who had it, it helps keep us updated on who is likely to get it.

Obviously, if you only have two goats, you can probably remember these things. But we have more than two and will definitely have even more. Not to mention that we plan on breeding goats for a long time. It would be nice to be able to go back at a glance and see who has been healthy and who hasn’t. I am working towards breeding healthier genetics with less need for worming

Who Needs Herd Sheets

If you have livestock that you need to do treatments to or have on a breeding schedule, I would say that you need these herd sheets. Sure, if you only have one bull, buck, rooster, whatever, you probably don’t need the breeding part for them. But I’ve got two bucks and I do need to be careful about who gets bred to who. Midas can breed everyone but Stella. Spike can breed anyone this year. But I want to wait until the girls are at least eight months old.

While I can go down the rabbit hole of all the technicalities of this, I think it’s safe to say that it’s better to have all this information in one spot. If I’m having to flip pages or do mental gymnastics, someone could get left out and that is dangerous when dealing with creatures that are not so great at keeping themselves alive.

Sheets In Use

The first video is Champ’s sheet and the second is the actual product and how to use it.

Its important to note, on Champ’s sheet, that before I created these sheets, I totally missed documenting fecals and other medications that were given. That can be life threatening when dealing with worms. Here in the south, worms are lethal. Sure, you can have a strong herd that rarely needs deworming. But we aren’t there yet. You can see at the bottom, that the last entry she was dewormed because the strongyles came back with a vengeance. Not to mention that her FAMACHA was a 4.

This sheet also helps keep me aware of weight loss, FAMACHA trends, and so on.

This is a brand new sheet and how to set it up.

Where To Get These Sheets?

You can find them on our store as a digital download. The PDF is for the Google Sheet link and they are super easy to fill out. The best thing to do is to make a copy of the first page, by right clicking and then click duplicate. Then rename the copy to your goat name. After that you can remove the information on there and replace it with your own.

I hope this sheet will help you as they have helped me. I strongly suggest either creating your own or picking up ours.

If you like the content I put out, feel free to buy us a coffee! It helps keep this site running, marketing and the goats in grain!

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Meet The Chaos

October 5, 2024 by Leigh Leave a Comment

My name is Leigh and my husband is Jared. We have been together for 20 years. We’ve got two ~~tornados~~ boys, Chase and Jaxson and a ton of animals. Jared and I work full time as paramedics, homeschool and homestead. The purpose of this blog is to chronical our journey but also to help you avoid the pitfalls of homesteading. We want you to learn from our mistakes so you can come out ahead of the game. It’s time to meet the chaos.

The Ultimate Homesteader’s Starter Bundle – Only $47!

Get the tools you need to stay organized, track profits, and manage your homestead with ease!

$99 value – now just $47! Start your homesteading journey today!

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Meet The Chaos

We started homesteading because we weren’t happy with the life we were “supposed” to live. Society tells us that we have to work in an office, warehouse, etc, get groceries at the store, only see our kids for a couple hours a night, and then do it all over again. We wanted something different.

So we bought our mini farm and have been working to turn it into our homestead. We have 10 goats, though that number changes depending on the season. There are approximately 50 poultry, again depends on the season and predator load. We’ve got 4 huge dogs, 2 cats, 4 bearded dragons and a snake.

We have learned a ton since being on the farm; from firewood to building and everything in between.

I started this blog to help new homesteaders learn as much as possible before diving in. When we were researching all the things that we wanted to do, paralysis by analysis became a real problem. We had so many ideas that we kind of froze.

So we sat down and really thought about the things we wanted to do, created our goals and got to work.

I created this download to help new homesteaders start and stay on track. There are other freebies in the members only area as well. You can sign up below and you will receive an email with the password to the members only area.

Homesteading is a lifestyle and means so many different things to everyone. So before you start panicking that your homestead isn’t big enough or you don’t know anything about brooding chickens, just realize that we were all clueless at some point.

But with a can do attitude, plenty of blood, sweat and tears, and some resourcefulness, you can homestead with the best of them!

Below are my top 5 blog posts to get you started!

Fall Garden Guide

In all the years that I’ve been growing a garden, the fall garden has steadily remained my favorite. Which is funny because I don’t really like any of the brassicas, which is what most people know the fall garden for. I prefer the root vegetables and cool air. But I have learned over the years…
Top Mistakes With Goats

We all know that I love my goats. Probably more than most people. They are seriously the coolest creatures on our farm. But there are some very common mistakes with goats that I would love to clear up today. I’ve talked before about goats not being beginner livestock and I will say it again and…
How To Bond With Your Goats

If you are lucky enough to win over the love of a skittish goat, count yourself lucky. Bella is my most skittish goat and will run as fast and as far as her short little legs will take her if anyone comes anywhere near her. But when she is scared or hurting? She looks to…

If you like the content I put out, feel free to buy us a coffee! It helps keep this site running, marketing and the goats in grain!

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If you like this post, feel free to share it and follow us below on our social media accounts!

What To Do With Those Feed Bags

October 1, 2024 by Leigh Leave a Comment

How many feed bags do you have laying around? Do you just throw them away? I’ve always been one to save dog food bags. I don’t know why. Probably the same reason so many people save shopping bags that they never, ever reuse. At least not at the rate they save them. But after cleaning up the basement for the 9 millionth time, and seeing a ton of bags, I decided enough was enough.

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What To Do With Those Feed Bags?

But how many bags do you really need? Well, according to my brain, I need all of them. It’s ridiculous. I cannot throw them away. No matter how hard I argue with myself about the fact that I don’t need to save every single one, I end up rolling it up and stowing it in another feed bag. So I started brainstorming, searching and the list below is how we reuse feed bags.

Why I save them

I feel like they are really good bags. They are made to hold 50# of food or more! That means they can hold all sorts of things. Plus, let’s be real here, you put anything sharp in a regular trash bag, even the heavy duty ones, and you are blowing a hole in it. Now, all that trash is all over the place. Not cool.

Another reason I am in favor of saving these bags is because I’ve already paid for them. Think about it, I bought the feed but I’m going to throw away a perfectly good bag because it’s empty? Absolutely not. Couple that and the fact that things are getting more and more expensive? I have all the reasons I need to hold on to and reuse feed bags.

Ways To Reuse Feed Bags

Trash Bags– Seriously, these make the most amazing trash bags! I don’t know where you live but trash bags by me are $15 for an 80ct box. When I am going and decluttering, I will reuse feed bags before I even touch my regular trash bags.

Tote Bags- Kathy over at Beyond The Chicken Coop has a great tutorial for making tote bags! These are seriously adorable and I will be making some! I love that I can make different sizes based on what I need. Plus, I know that if I can make the seams strong, they will be strong because again, they hold 50# of feed!

Hay Feeders- Danielle At DIY Danielle, talks about some of the pros and cons of doing it this way. I have found that it works well, until it doesn’t. I love the portability of this style bag, I can nail it to a tree or hang it in the goat barn. But it’s still only going to last so long.

Organizer- Yes, you read that right. We will use these bags to put all of the same type of stuff together. For example: We will store all of our nursery pots in a feed bag. Or if we are going the the back of the property to cut trees, we will put the bar oil, fuel, hatchet, etc in the bag. Now, we take them out immediately after so that we aren’t mixing chemicals if one should mysteriously open. BUT to get all those tools out to the area we are working now only takes one trip.

Planters- We have grown some amazing potatoes, carrots, and onions in these bags. But be sure to use the plastic ones for this! Patrick and Jessie at Southern Dreams Homestead has a great and in depth post about growing in containers that will help you here.

Tarps- Yea, I wasn’t sure about this one but the idea is definitely there! Sweet Meadow Sampler has a great tutorial on it. We will be trying it soon though.

Flooring– I personally would do this in the winter to make clean out in the spring easier. One of the biggest headaches we have come spring, has nothing to do with the garden. It’s cleaning out the barn and coop. Having these bags would not only insulate them from the ground, it would also help clean up all the pine shavings, poop, urine and more.

Compost- it is feasible that you could compost in these bags. The plastic would trap heat and allow break down faster. The thick paper bags are compositable themselves. In theory (I have not tried this yet) you could fill a bag and empty it in your compost pile. Or you could use the bag AS your compost pile. You can go more in depth about composting with The Homestead RD, Katie has some truly amazing posts about compost. In the post I linked above, she also uses feed bags as planters and can tell you how to do it.

Weed Suppression– We have used the paper feed bags to line the bottoms of our raised beds. It works about the same as using cardboard but it is FAR more readily available for us. I don’t know that I would use the plastic ones through.

Wood- We will put our small pieces of scrap wood in these bags to help keep the basement cleaned up. We have a ton of projects around here and I’m not going to throw away or burn a piece of good wood just because it’s a smidge too small. By putting it in the feed bags, we reduce clutter and reuse the bag.

Projects– Sometimes when we have multiple projects going on, it’s hard to keep everything separated. So I will put all the supplies for a project in a feed bag and then write on the front what it’s for. This has helped a ton when it comes to organization.

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This advice does not replace that of a Veterinarian! Please consult with your Vet if you have ANY questions about this post, what to feed or how to feed your animals!

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What To Do With Those Feed Bags?

Why I save them

Ways To Reuse Feed Bags

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