Before you bring home livestock prepare for them

My husband is a veritable math and science genius but when it comes to common sense he is completely lacking. Needless to say I do the farming, he does the finances.

I think much of it is just plain negligent.

I don't fault someone for doing their best but missing something. As Awnry Abe said, there is a learning curve.

I have a 'friend' that bought land and animals. He thought it would be like Farmville 2. He has his farm for sale and took the animals that where left to the auction.

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Dorothy Kaye Collins

Some learning curves worse than others...no doubt. But anyone who thinks a simple class would cover all scenarios hasn't had enough animals.

I am very anxious to get some land and a "few" animals. I will be getting them one at a time, learning before I shop and taking a wise soul with me when I do shop. I will follow all directions and since I do not panic easily I think I will be alright. I am also not afraid to kill it and eat it if need be. Sis

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www.MontanaSticksAndStones.com at Goshen Farm

A class won't cover everything obviously but it would give them a basic idea of what they are looking at. It would prevent things like people buying calves at auction and not knowing they need bottle feeding.

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"You can never get a cup of tea large enough or a book long enough to suit me." C S Lewis

DH went to our last property and hauled back the pig house. This will be modified and we will be getting an electric mesh fence, BEFORE we move our chickens here and get more... The chickens will be very happy with the pig house, but in time, they will get back their bigger chicken house when DH can move that. We wouldn't think to get a critter before insuring it had a good home with the proper food.

Scary those folks who lack common sense...they have children

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Christie Acres
www.SequimForLife.com
http://www.irealtyvirtualbrokers.com...lori-christie/
http://luxurywaterviewhomes.com/
SequimLiving@gmail.com

I have a dog and he is a handful at times. Some of friends still living in the concrete jungle tell me I should get farm animals. I live on a few acres with 1 outbuilding and an old house. I tell them I do not have enough room for cows or such. Maybe a few chickens or a small pig pen. However I do like to travel and traveling and farm animals do not mix. Sure I could hire someone to watch the animals while I travel but why?

They do not understand, they tell me they would get a whole bunch of goats and chickens and pigs and cows and such. I tell them to do themselves a favor and stay in the city they will be happier.

A man has to know his limitations or he will just be mean and miserable, or maybe he will not even survive.

Nope the only 1/2 cow or pig I buy is ready for the freezer. I get my chickens and eggs from a neighbor who raises them.

I do have a huge garden, that is enough work in itself. Nobody will hate you for killing a tomato plant.

Works for me.

Sad those folks don't have to be certified or anything before having kids lol. My daughter had one this past spring (20 years old) and she would quickly tell ya even though she was one of 5 children in my family and had been around babies most of her life she felt woefully unprepared to bring a baby home from the hospital in many ways.

As far as people keeping animals even though I live in a VERY rural area of Georgia there are tons of people around here that have no clue on how to take care of animals. A huge part of that is that when we (my generation and the ones younger) were younger and growing up for the most part we only thought about 'escaping the rural lifestyle'. We missed out on gleaning that wealth of information we could had from the elders of the area (the WII generation and older) and from even our own parents (whom many have gone on now). Some of us did realize however that apparently some thirst for a rural lifestyle rubbed off on us in our youth and now we do everything we can to revive what was lost. Raising animals isn't for the faint of heart or the 'satisfaction now' type people....but it can be VERY rewarding in it's own way.

I am thankful that there are still many in this world who don't mind sharing some of the knowledge they have gathered through the years.

In the early 90's, we lived outside a town in central AR that had a livestock auction. We had a neighbor about 1/4 mile away between us and town so we had to pass his house often. According to neighbors who knew him, he was not the brightest bulb in the box but he still had a driver's license, voted, lived independently, etc. He'd been raised on that property, maybe 2-3 acres, by an aunt and uncle who were already gone when we moved there. I did my best to avoid him.

So, this joker would go to the livestock auctions and buy whatever animals struck his fancy. Of course, he had no shelter and minimal (as in falling down) fencing. He was constantly coming to our house to ask if he could go into our pasture to see if "his new goats" had found their way in with ours. I had to take him to the gate to prove to him that I didn't have his goats. Thank goodness we had two Pyrs who were really pussycats but still put on quite a show for strangers and I was able to convince this man that he DID NOT want to enter the pasture without me or my husband. For the record, none of his missing goats ever found their way to our house.

On another occasion, he brought home a potbelly sow and two young boars. They immediately escaped but we had enough predator population that they didn't last long to root in folks' gardens. It wasn't before one of the boars came to our house and fought with our Pyrs who were trying to chase him away. At least they weren't hurt, thanks to their thick coats and ability to double team the hog.

The one time that really ticked me off was his bringing home a largish pony and keeping the poor thing in a slat sided covered livestock trailer for several weeks in July. Even with the distance, I could hear the pony whinnying day and night and it broke my heart. I don't know if it had been fed or had water but for those few weeks, that poor creature had a hellish existence. I never asked around the neighborhood what happened to it because I just did not want to know. What I would have liked was to put that jerk into the trailer and leave him for a few weeks during the hottest summer we had while we lived there. I think there are laws against such constraint of humans though.

Always wondered why an act of kindness is often called humane when humans can so often be anything but...

Getting off my soap box now.