How large a homestead do we need?

[retiredbop]

DW is presently talking about raising goats and chickens and a huge self-sufficient garden. Maybe a road side stand to sell the excess. I'm thinking about a few Guineas too. If we do this we're going to specialize in only "heritage"(?) breeds, preserving the genetic diversity, etc.

So for just the two of us, what is the consensus for the number of chickens we'd need to keep two people supplied in eggs year round and still have plenty of roasters for the freezer?

Then we get to the more interesting question of how many goats do we keep for milk for two, and maybe playing around with cheese and butter making?

Then based on those numbers, how much land do you think we need to look for to have enough space for everyone, including the Guineas.

I'm using the WAG system here and saying at least 5 acres, but 10 would be better.

[agmantoo]

5 to 7 acres would meet your needs without the Guineas. Guineas like to roam around and the 5 here in the community cover around 500 acres. ; )

[uncle Will in In.]

All acres aren't created equal. You can't compare the middle of Illinois with west Texas. If your acres are in decent farmable ground where there is ample annual rainfall, 10 acres would produce all you could eat, and a great amount to sell. Meanwhile giving you more exercise than any three people you know.
There will never be the right amount of laying hens. They always are laying too many or not enough eggs. Of course you could have extra hens and sell free range brown eggs to your underprivaledged friends who ain't got a chicken for a nice price. One milking goat could most likely furnish you enough milk while she is giving milk, but they quit giving milk a while before the next kid (S) are born. Getting two nanny goats to take turns furnishing your milk might become a tricky problem. Oh well You may as well have about 6 goats. You will fall in love with them and not be able to part with the kids. Keep half the guineas shut up every other day so the rest won't go so far afield. If that don't work I'll give your money back for the advice. You'll see here that there is a whopping big difference between Advice and Help. Keep your hoe sharp. Unk

[retiredbop]

I had read they covered more ground, but I didn't think they ran that much. The article in Back Home this month said they can be trained to return to the hen house each night to roost. I was sort of hoping to keep them on the homestead so they didn't annoy the neighbors too mcuh. Although from what I've read, just their noise can do that.

[anniew]

I think you will need a minimum number of acres. My 35 chickens, 20 ducks, 6 geese, and 10 guineas pasture on about a half acre. A one acre garden will supply you and a couple other families with veggies (maybe not feed for the animals, however), and I don't know about goats.
My guineas roam a little further to maybe 4-5 acres and rarely go over the fences (fencing is too keep deer out of the growing areas) although they can easily. They cross that line maybe 3 times a year. They return to the coop or the roof of the coop (mostly inside) each night. The secret is to keep them confined for a month or more to make sure they know where their home and food is located. Cracked corn or millet (I'm told) are great inducers for their return. I have two coops, one has chickens and four guineas, and the other has chickens, 6 guineas and all the ducks and geese with an outside fenced and topped area where they stay at night (in or out is their decision, but it is totally fenced). The ducks always stay out in the fenced area even in terrible cold and snow/blizzard conditions. The geese usually stay out but sometimes go in the enclosed coop. I let them all out by mid-morning, and close up the coops/secure fenced areas around 10-11 at night when I take the dog out for his last walk of the evening.
It's always nice to have extra land for privacy, expansion, or a woodlot. Think hard about what is important and how much money you want to spend so that you don't get in over your head and/or so that you don't have too much to take care of, and/or how much privacy you want. If the land is fertile, you can get away with a lot less.
Ann

[RACCOON]

Get as many acres as you can afford, property values almost always go up
You can always sell or rent what you dont use.
Twenty years ago brought land for $5000 a forty now worth $200,000 a forty

[TxGypsy]

LOL this is the million dollar question. Here's the two bit answer. You will always need just a couple of acres more than what you can afford

A really good 2 acres is better than a lousy 10. Go for quality over quantity. Read all you can and ask others for advice. The more efficiently you can do something the less space you need. Get the book....Square Foot Gardening. You don't have to have an acre tilled up to get a lot of veggies(physician heal thyself..lol). For goats I wouldn't bother wasting a lot of area on pasture. They normally just sit in the barn hollering for you to bring them some hay and grain and ignore the pasture. Goats as a general rule don't do really well on 'normal' pasture. If you have several acres of briars and small trees that you want cleared they'll be happy to oblige you(or fig trees...grrrr). For two people wanting to make some cheese I'd have 4-5 goats....but then, I make a LOT of cheese...you might not. Start out with 3 and add or let them make the increase with their kids. Of course not all goats are created equal. Some give lots of milk and some give almost none. Why on earth do you want guineas? They are noisy, walk across your metal roof at the crack of dawn(sounds like a herd of elephants) and if you let them loose you will never catch them except with a 22. On the upside they do make good dressing. I'd like to suggest that you consider beekeeping. It takes very little space, you are harvesting your neighbors fields, it is totally fascinating/addictive and almost everybody loves honey

[Terri]

For eggs, I figure on 5 eggs per week per hen. How many eggs do you want?

Though, they lay better during the spring and less during the winter.

[Freeholder]

The answer is: (tada!) It All Depends!

Garden size: are you just going to grow some fresh stuff for salads, or all your fruits, veggies, and grains, plus some livestock feed?

Chickens: how many eggs do you eat; how good of layers are the breeds you want to raise; do you plan to sell eggs?

Goats: how much milk do you drink; can you, or do you want to, sell milk; are you planning to make a lot of cheese? Do you want to have extra kids to go in the freezer? (Goat meat is good.)

If you just want a small garden for fresh salad stuff, you could probably manage with 10' x 20' or a little more (better to start small, anyway, as it's harder to improve new ground where there's never been a garden before). If you want to raise all your food, plus some livestock feed, even using raised beds count on at least half an acre. If you allow an acre for the garden, and work on improving that area, you can rotate, which is a good thing. Plan on another half acre to an acre for fruit trees and berries and other perennials. (It's possible to do all this on a city lot, though -- you don't HAVE to have an acreage.)

The chickens don't really need to take up much space at all if you just have a few in a chicken tractor. Or even two or three chicken tractors -- rotate them through unplanted portions of the garden and orchard; use them to mow the lawn; rotate them through the pasture and paddocks to disperse the goat manure and eat fly larvae. If you figure a 4' x 10' chicken tractor is sufficient accomodation for ten hens, you can see that they don't need to take up much space, even if you have several tractors and use them as breeding pens. Depending on what breeds of chickens you get, ten hens would lay enough eggs for most couples and small families even if they use quite a few eggs. Some breeds are better winter layers than others -- you might want to do some investigating there before deciding on your breed.

You have to have at least two goats, because they are very unhappy alone. And for most small families, two decent-milking goats is really all they need, even if they are making some cheese. Try to breed them to kid several months apart if you don't want to be without milk for a few weeks each year. You don't need to keep a buck unless you can't find any neighbors who raise goats and already have a buck (and by neighbors, I mean anyone within an hour's driving time -- you'll have to catch your does in heat and transport them to the buck on the same day, as they don't stay in heat for very long). Goats don't *have* to have pasture -- mine are in pens and only come out to browse when I have time to take them for a walk. But it will save on feed costs if they have a good brushy pasture. Of course, you'll spend a bundle fencing it tight enough to hold goats, so what you save in one place, you'll spend in another. If you want to supply pasture, in a humid area with good rainfall and decent soil, figure four to six goats per acre. In dryer climates they'll need a lot more area than that. If you have room and the ambition, a few extra does will supply you with enough butcher kids to fill your freezer (selecting good meat breeds will help --Boer and Kiko and their crosses, or for a smaller animal, Kinders).

Have you considered adding a woodlot to your plans for firewood and construction materials? Depending on climate, and on your stove and how well insulated the house is, you might need anywhere from three to ten acres of woodlot.

Kathleen

[Cheryl in SD]

Order Carla Emery's book, The Encyclopedia of Country Living. I was reading it this weekend and it has a whole section on this very question. (If you order over $25.00 at Amazon you get free shipping, so pick another book to go with it.)

[tnhomestead]

I must have strange gueneas -- in the coop every nite and dont range that far at all~ but they will eat every tick around!

[linn]

Soil quality differs with location. If you want goats, chickens and guineas along with a garden try to get ten acres if you can afford it. Start out small and grow as you gain confidence in what you and your DW can handle. It is always better to have a few more acres than you need at first. Homesteading is addictive. Most people want to add a few projects and animals as the years go by. One note on guineas, they do like to roam and are the noisiest critters we have ever owned. We finally got rid of ours. If your goats are good milkers, two nannies should keep you in milk all year round if they are bred so that they freshend at different times of the year. I don't know much about goats. They may be seasonal breeders. We have always milked a cow.