Easiest farm animals to have on farm?

[thestartupman]

In your opinion, what is the easiest farm animals to keep and care for on a farm?. This does not include pets. It would be good if you can tell why you believe the animals easy to care for. Maybe include how they are beneficial on the farm. If they are profitable, how do you market them?

[gracie88]

Honeybees, by a long shot. No fencing , care is minimal, they're quiet, they pollinate stuff, easy to protect from the occasional predator (unless you have bears, that might be a problem). Honey pretty much sells itself, at least around here, and you can sell the beeswax or make value-added stuff without too much trouble.

[thestartupman]

I would think there would be a lot of learning to be done with bees? It is on my list of things to have on the farm. It just seems to be a lot to their care.

[thestartupman]

Okay, I know chickens will come up on here. I would say they are the easiest farm animals to care for. I have a coop with chickens that I put up each night, and make sure they have feed and water. They free range all day long. I have several others that moved to the barn, or were born in the barn that I do not put up, and they only get food from what is left over from other farm animals. The only problem I have with chickens is the eggs being eaten by snakes.

[bluefish]

I'd say it really depends on your setup. My easiest are the steer. I have a lot of acreage and they just go off and do their own thing. I just have to keep the trough filled. I do have to hay them in winter, but that's not a big deal. Throw a round bale out once a month or so, I only have 2-3 at any one time.

Actually, if set up right, none are really a big deal. I have the above mentioned steers, goats, chickens, turkeys and rabbits. Outside of milking the goats, daily chores take me 15 minutes.

[farmmaid]

Rabbits.....My good doe gives me 135+ pounds of meat a year. Keep a trio, two does and a buck.

[farmerDale]

Hair sheep out on pasture, raised on forage and grass. Easier than chickens here, cuz they require no manure shovelling.

Trim feet, no shearing, no crutching, fairly parasite resistant. Lamb out on grass, not in a jug. Feed em in the winter, takes about 5 minutes a day. Super profitable if you find the right market.

Chickens are good too.

It entirely depends on your setup. If you have proper fencing, proper feed, and labour saving devices, most any animal is quite easy to raise come to think of it. Pigs, cattle, goats, chickens, sheep, bison.

My laying hens, on a per acre basis are the most profitable critter per acre though. Feed em a bit, and they give eggs that everyone craves. We NET 4 dollars an 18 pack.

[thestartupman]

Sheep are something I have been looking into for quite a while. My biggest issue I see with them is predators. I do have a good LGD, and a decent fence around the property. I still think that the coyotes would take their toll on the sheep. I know I have enough of them living on the property.

[jwal10]

We tend goats, rabbits, chickens and pigeons, none are hard. Just have to take the time to milk the goats, clean the equipment and make the products. Butchering takes a little time but not bad for the amount of meat provided. We do have to preserve it, where the others can all be used fresh. I think rabbits are the easiest all around for what we get out of them. Chickens have to be let out each day, put back up in the evening, tougher to butcher, my feed program is cheap, just a little more time consuming in the winter when I heat their feed, mix it and take it out to them. Pigeons are easy food, just skin, clean and done. Chickens give me meat, eggs, fertilizer and the bugs are gone. I like them all. Beef are to big for us, here. We get enough young pigs given to us that we don't grow them anymore. Easiest for us is the raccoons, no fences, we share some food but I usually "harvest" before too much damage is done. Fish can be easy, but sometimes they don't mind when it is catching time....James

[1shotwade]

the best animal to start with is the one you are most interested in!It should be a labor of love not a new career!! This aside i think the smaller the critter the better for beginners.(can't get much smaller than honeybees!) any kind of foul,rabbits etc. and if you are enjoying it step up to the goats/sheep and so on.Just let it be fun and not work!
btw bees are easy to learn as well as easy to care for!

[farmerDale]

Originally Posted by thestartupman

Sheep are something I have been looking into for quite a while. My biggest issue I see with them is predators. I do have a good LGD, and a decent fence around the property. I still think that the coyotes would take their toll on the sheep. I know I have enough of them living on the property.

I am a firm believer in GOOD fences. No fiddling around, no expenses spared. We too live in coyote country, and wolf, and bear. So far our five foot TALL page wire has kept them out and the sheep in. I am always concerned about digging, but IMO, the critter needs to have had a taste usually to try to DIG in for a meal. If they do not know the animal is prey in the first place, a successful hunt behind them, I think they have little reason to dig in. So far we're good.

I do share your concern. I always have in the back of my mind, my theory may be way off. We have a good farm dog, an Aussie who patrols around. I hunt and trap, and so keep the predator population in check to the extent that I can.

My main concern is moose who tend to wreck good fences. In the treed area, I patrol this frequently, just to ensure a moose has not created an opening for predators. Thankfully, I can hunt moose too, but they are thick like ticks on a dogs ears around here!

[FarmboyBill]

Yeah If you only have 3 rabbits and a one of thems a buck, that ought to be easy. Course, If the bucks sterile, r the does don't like him for any number of reasons, OR the does sterile, or cannibalistic, or hyper, they aren't going to do much. I had up to 150 some rabbits and 15 bucks, and I still ran into many litters not being born or 1/2/whole eaten, ect.
Chickens seem to take care of themselves. Just keep feed and water for them in the evening and get the eggs is about it.

Cows and goats are rather easy also. Just not the male members of those 2 tribes. The females are or can be tame, and are satisfying to be around, working with.

Hogs, IF you have a huge pasture with many lots in it, AND a pond can be just as easy as anything, plus you don't have to go gather eggs, or milk twice a day. Keep them fed and they will cause you NO problems. Slack up on there feeding for a week, and youll never be able to keep them in. Best to sell them and wait till you got the money and feed saved up before starting with hogs again.

[fordson major]

farmerDale, those moose are tasty as well!! have seen coyotes get into a 12 foot highgame fenced pen with fox lights and 50ft from the house, ours can be hand raised by humans so lose the fear of man.

[farmerDale]

Moose are delish! Our coyotes here are thankfully wild animals, which helps. They have a VERY healthy fear of man. How did it get in the twelve foot fence???

[o&itw]

I raise rabbits. if one puts the money into decent cages etc in the first place, they are fairly easy if you feed pellets. In my opinion chickens are much easier and less expensive to start with. Unless you are lucky, you will be getting young rabbits, and there is a learning curve for both you and them before you start getting litters consistently. Once you get them started and your routine down, they are fairly easy. If you look into chickens, though, you can start them and get them going with out the up front trouble and expense. Their coop and feeders can all be made by hand with some scrap lumber, especially if you already have a space in a shed. They usually don't need inoculations, or even medication if you raise them sanitarily. Usually a heat lamp, a waterer and a place you can lock them in away from predators at night is all you must have.

Of course a steer or two out on pasture is fairly easy, but if you are actually raising cattle there are all kinds of innoculations, possible dehorning, cattle chute, good fences, hay for the winters (or drought), neutering for the steers. Chickens are also the least expensive thing to learn with if you haven't rasied animals before.

As to your other question. You are not likely to make substanital money on any kind of farm animal unless you go into it in a big way. I can buy meat less expensively than I can raise rabbits for meat. Now, while it is difficult to make any profit on a ledger, there are advantages. For instance, with my rabbits, I get meat that I know is not full of antibiotics or hormones, and has been handled sanitarily. The manure I get from them has turned my clay garden soil into something comparable to African violet potting soild. My grandkids are learning responsibility, by doing the feeding and care of them, when they stay here and enjoy doing it. So it really has to be considered as a means to be a bit more self reliant than the average American, and spending my spare time in an enjoyable manner.

[Awnry Abe]

Here is what we have, ranked in terms least demanding if my time and mental energy to most:

1) LGD
2) barn cats
3) beef cattle
4) ducks *
5) fryers
6) rabbits *
7) layers
8) meat goats
9) dairy cattle
10) dairy goats

The ducks and rabbits provide for our family alone. Everything else finds its way to someone else's kitchen. None are unapproachable for a beginner, require huge capital outlay, aside from land, fences, and ponds. Also, there is no disgrace in being #10 on my list. I don't know what #11 will be, but the dairy goats are a relative snap and pure joy and they wouldn't make me look away from the next thing. A lamb or three and a hog are next in line.

You'd probably enjoy reading _You Can Farm_ by Joel Salatin. It basically answers your questions, and is fun to read.

[Shrek]

Originally Posted by thestartupman

In your opinion, what is the easiest farm animals to keep and care for on a farm?. This does not include pets. It would be good if you can tell why you believe the animals easy to care for. Maybe include how they are beneficial on the farm. If they are profitable, how do you market them?

For me the easiest critter is my worm herd.

I use them to make topsoil , as tillers in my garden, trade them as scratch feed to a small chicken farmer for eggs and fryers ,use them to catch fish for my breakfast and as the ultimate organic trash recycler and document shredder.

Best part is on rainy days when I can't tend the outside gardens and worm beds I can tend and container garden in my indoor worm bins I kep in my greenhouse room.

[CountryWannabe]

I currently have chickens, hair sheep, dairy goats and Dexter cattle. I would say that the chickens and sheep are the easiest and cheapest to keep and have given me the most back, although now I have cut back my numbers to just sufficient to feed me and DH, with some for the family when they want it. I have usually sold eggs from my totally free range chickens, and as I don't specifically feed them other than in winter they have been (probably) profitable. I have usually got a good price for the grass fed lambs, and as they have grazed all spring and summer and been sold/butchered in the fall before needing to be hayed, that has been a good deal for me. Obviously, I have had to hay the breeding flock over winter, but the sheep have always turned a profit. Word of mouth has always sold my lambs. When I cut the flock drastically I did send a few to the sale barn, but that isn't the best place to sell if you are looking to make any money. When you want quite a few gone in a short time, and don't want to deal with the Craig's List tire-kickers though, it is a good place to go.

It rather depends on where you are, the weather conditions, how much land you have and how much of the animals' feed you can provide on that land. Where I am now I have enough property to feed the number of animals I have during the warm weather, but have to hay them in late fall/winter, which is fine for me (though may be a consideration for others).

The weather was too hot in summer for rabbits to be a decent proposition for me, as they go sterile in high heat, so I was barely breaking even with them. I found ducks too messy for a property that didn't have a large pond, though I surely do love Muscovy meat. I loved my pigs but they were hard on my fences and I ended up feeding them mostly bagged food, so I actually lost money on them. I butchered them all before moving out to my new place. My pocketbook thanked me.

We do have coyotes hereabouts. We have electric fencing on most of the fences and two LGDs that know their business. It helps that all our neighbors have LGDs also. I think that they are a major deterrent. Snakes I have never worried about. I collected eggs two to three times a day when I had a larger flock, now I just check the nests in the morning, but it wouldn't be difficult to do it more often. I don't begrudge the occasional egg to a snake, because they keep the rats and mice way down.

Mary

[LoonyK]

I feel the easiest is birds. I like chickens, ducks, and guineas. If some die, oh well, easy to multiply them. Converts insects that I rather not eat into edible meat and eggs.

[arnie]

I have all the homestead livestock . I like my rabbits and chickens as well as the feeder pig . they all must be fed and watered. the biggest contributer to the homestead by far is my gentiel giant milk cow a brown swiss she provides all my dairy wants n needs with plenty left over to share with the pig pups ect.but I have to milk her twice a day buy keeping her calf she also fills the freezer with tender organic beef every year. the rabbits are easy with there own shed and auto matic watering chore time is short .chickens are free range just toss out some feed and they are done with a well fenced lot the pig gets fed and watered but could be set up with an auto feeder and waterer to even greatly limit this the beef cows live on pasture and only get fed hay in winter with the big bales one or twice a week even though I pamper them with some graine to keep them tame and easy to handle .every thing depends on how your housing for them is set up having to hand water all the rabbits in winter preticulary would be a pain as would having to muck out a stall for the milkcow but with plenty of pasture and a milking barn with a lot for the calf she comes in on time for milking . beef on pasture require very little care I have a free running spring fed creek on the farm so watering is never an issue it never freezes over even in winter. I on occasion have trouble with black snakes getting in a hens nest but by keeping all the feed in mouse proof containers and the weeds and grass eatin by cows I only notice them rarely .another big thing with all livestock is to avoid falling for bargan moungrel breeding stock pure bred rabbits cost a little more but there is a market for breeding stock when you can't give a mutt away . there is a small animail auction near me and when good large stock hens bring 12$ 1/2 bantys or mixes bring 2$ same with cattle good black angus beef always brig more at sale usally 10-20% over otherbeef types but often 50% more than long horns and dairy crosses or hosteens .and it cost the same to feed a cull as it does a pure bred . I still hear people say they are the same when the hide comes off but that's very untrue . better to take advantage of generations of experience of good pro breeders who have culled out problems to your advantage. even a feeder pig of good breeding will out grow a razor back and have better meat and be easyer to handle . common brush goats are harder to fence and big boers bring much more at sale when you fix up your barn or pens ust always think of making it easy for yourself when butchering time comes with a loading shute 'of acsess to water . having the rabbit shed in the garden makes for a short trip when cleaning manure . on and on a couple good books to read are;the homesteders guideto raiseing small livestock by Jerome belanger' ,and the family cow by vanloon , usally on ebay or amazon second hand cheep or free from the library .