How to Choose Animals and Crops to Raise on Your Farm

So you've decided to start a small farm. But you're not sure what animals to raise, or what to plant. How do you decide?

What Appeals to You?

It seems obvious, but the most likely candidates for farm animals are the ones that you're drawn to naturally. If goats seem odd or strange, maybe they're not for you. Perhaps you have fond memories of petting cows on your grandparents' farm, or have a fondness for pigs.

If your goal is to start a business with your farm, think carefully about markets for your product, and do some research to see if there is demand for it. If your goal is self-sufficiency, you'll want to consider what kind of food you and your family like to eat. Don't raise pigs if you never eat pork!

Be Cautious About the Unusual

Often, people are drawn to unusual or exotic animals. Their thought process is often that something that isn't "what everybody else is doing" will be marketable. This isn't always a logical conclusion. While specialty crops can be a great way to generate income, sometimes this can backfire. Be sure there's a market for your unusual animal, herb, vegetable or fruit before investing a lot of money in it.

Make a List

Make a list of your potential animals and crops. Leave room for notes, and make sure to list the reasons why you are considering this particular animal or crop. Use this list to gather tidbits of information as you get further into the research process.

Read About It

Go to the library or your local independent bookstore and look at everything you can find about the animals and crops on your list. Use the Internet to search for basic information on raising each animal. At this point, you might start narrowing down your list as you find out more details. Whenever you lose focus, look back at your goals for your farm and ask yourself: does this animal or crop further my goals?

Talk to Farmers

You've pondered it, read about it, and thought some more about it. Sometimes you just have to experience things to figure out your path, and nowhere is this more true than farming.

Find some local farmers who are raising the animals or crops you're considering. Ask them about their successes and their challenges. Go pet the animals, see the housing and fencing that the farmer has chosen, experience the animals in three dimensions.

Now you've had a chance to thoroughly explore some potential animals and crops for your farm. You're ready to choose some to start with! How exciting!

Raising Healthy Turkeys from Poults

If you're starting your turkey flock with day-old poults, you are probably wondering how to make sure they grow into healthy, happy adult turkeys. With some preparation and care, your baby turkeys will thrive.

Set Everything Up

Just like for baby chicks, you'll need to set up a brooder for your turkey poults. A turkey poult brooder is just the same as one for baby chickens, so you can use these resources to design your brooder. The key is to have everything set up and warmed to 95 to 98 degrees before your poults arrive. Also similar to baby chicks, the poults will huddle under the lap if they're too cold, or stay at the edges of the heat source if they're too hot. So while a thermometer can be a helpful guide to temperature, especially before the poults arrive, use their behavior as your guide.

You will raise the heat lamp a few inches each week (and roughly 5 degrees lower) until the temperature is the same as the outdoors or the poults are 6 weeks old. You'll also want to have feeders and waterers filled and placed properly. You don't want them right under the lamp, but you also don't want them too far from the center. Place them so that the poults can get to them easily without getting either chilled or overheated. Hanging feeders can prevent poults from standing - and pooping - in the feed or knocking it over.

Use pine shavings - never cedar - for the bottom of the brooder. Once poults are three weeks old, some farmers like to use clean sand. It can be cleaned just like cat litter and keeps the brooder dry.

Finally, make sure you have their roosts and pen ready for them to move to after they outgrow the need for the heat lamp and are ready to move to pasture.

As Soon As They Get Home

Once your poults arrive home from the feed store or from the post office, inspect each one as you remove it from the transport box. Dip its beak in water as soon as you put them into the brooder, so they learn where the water is and how to drink. Remember that especially for shipped poults, they will be stressed from the transport process. Make sure they eat and drink well for the first two weeks.

Preventing Problems

Turkey poults are particularly prone to "starving out," which means that some poults will get pushed away from the feeder or hang back, and will actually starve to death despite food being available. Keep a close eye on poults while they're feeding to make sure this doesn't happen.

Overcrowding can also contribute to starving out, so make sure you have plenty of room for your poults. You'll want at least a 10x10 space for a dozen day-old poults, and as they get bigger they will need more room.

Add a Roost

By three weeks of age, you can add a roost to your brooder. Teaching turkeys to roost early helps when they're eventually moved to roosts later. Plus, they will sleep warmer and more comfortably.

Feed Them Properly

There are many different feeds for poultry. Medicated, nonmedicated, starter, grower - what to pick? Turkeys need high protein, more so than chickens. A gamebird or poultry starter that has around 28 percent protein works for the first 12 weeks. Medicated or not is your choice; many small growers like to use nonmedicated feed. After 12 weeks, the feed can be lowered to 20 percent, but any lower and your turkeys won't grow as big as they could.

Move Them Outside

As your poults grow, you will need to make the brooder bigger so they aren't crowded. As mentioned above, each week you will raise the lamp and lower the temperature about five degrees. Or, you could switch to lower-wattage bulbs as they grow. Much like vegetables, you will need to "harden off" your turkey poults by gradually exposing them to outside temperatures. By three weeks, they can have access to an enclosed "sun porch" on nice days - but keep them inside on rainy or cold days.

Make sure they are fully feathered and at least eight weeks old before moving poults to their new outdoor housing. You can give them access to outdoors but still provide the lamp at night for a week or two, and then finally move them to their new, grown-up turkey roosts and pen. Check on them nightly for a few days after the transition. Make sure they don't get damp or chilled.

Electronet and Chicken Tractors

If you decide you want to raise pastured poultry, whether for eggs or meat, you'll need to provide your chickens with fresh grass, bugs, weeds and such to eat. How? By making sure they always have a new patch of grass to munch.

When I first started raising chickens, I didn't understand the different options. What was electric fencing for? How often would I have to move it? Did they need a chicken tractor too? Could they be raised in just a chicken tractor with no outside pasture? I found the answers and want to share them with you as you venture into the world of keeping chickens.

Electric Net Fencing, aka Electronet
Electric net fencing, also called electronet, is one option for containing poultry. Light, movable, and quickly installed, electric net fencing is used for sheep, goats, and even cattle. For poultry, high netting is usually recommended - 42 or 48 inches - and the nets are spaced closer together, preventing small hens from escaping.

How does electronet work? Electronet consists of horizontal electrified wires held in place with vertical plastic strings. You need an energizer, which is powered by a connection to electricity, a battery, or a small solar panel, and a ground rod, which is driven into the ground near the energizer.

One other key with electric net fencing: you must move it often and mow underneath, because brush in contact with the fence will reduce the voltage on the fence and therefore its effectiveness.

Chicken Tractor
A chicken tractor is simply a movable coop for a flock of chickens. The idea behind a chicken tractor is that the birds can be somewhat confined and moved often to a fresh patch of grass, eliminating the need for a permanent coop area and bedding, and allowing the hens to eat fresh grass, grubs, bugs, seeds, and weeds without having them roam completely freely over the land.

Chicken tractors can work one of two ways. Sometimes they're used in conjunction with electronet, and chickens are moved less frequently. This allows the chicken tractor method to work with larger flocks where a coop large enough to comfortably house the whole flock would have to be so large, it wouldn't be very portable.

Or, the chicken tractor is built large enough for the entire flock to live in it all the time, and move it as the patch of grass underneath is used up. Oftentimes these chicken tractors have part of the tractor enclosed only in mesh and part with a roof, so the chickens can have sunshine and shade. (Chickens love shade!) The benefit to this design is that you don't have to move both a fence and a chicken tractor. The drawback is you may be moving the tractor more often, and the chickens are truly confined all the time. This method works better with smaller flocks, where the chicken tractor doesn't have to be very large for the hens to be happy with the space. It works particularly well in suburban or urban settings where electric net fencing would be unwieldy or unattractive.

There are many plans and ideas for chicken tractors available on the Internet, and they range from tiny, for 3 or 4 hens, to large.

Happy New Year

Merry Christmas !

Angora Goat

How long do angoras live? Do they need special care as they age?

In our flock, it is not uncommon for our girls to go 9-11 years- undoubtedly we could push them longer, but they do not stay unless they can put kids on the ground. Best suggestion is keep on top of their body score and adjust your feeding program accordingly. If you have several, this could mean seperating the geriatrics from the rest of the flock for TLC.

What vaccinations does an angora need? What about worming?

Tetanus and overeating (this is 1 shot combined) once per year, the kids get 2 doeses a few weeks apart and then once annually. Worming at least 4 times per year, kids we worm every month up until 6 months, every two months until a year. Also, we keep a coccistat in the feed for the kids to prevent coccidia (you won't have to worry about this with adults though).

Are angoras good for brush clearing?

Angora goats are indeed excellent brush clearers and weed eaters. A few years ago when we moved to Ohio we rented a pasture that was absolutely covered in multi-flora rose bushes as tall as I am (5'9"). After two grazing seasons the roses were almost totally gone along with all the other burs, weeds etc. The lighter the stocking rate the longer it will take them to take down any existing browse, but they will with time.

I read that Angoras are "delicate" and have trouble with cold, wet weather. Have you found this to be true?

First, let me premise this by saying I have raised angoras several very cold, wet climates and experienced no difficulty. The only time that an angora is particularly susceptible to cold/wet is the three weeks after shearing. If they do not have shelter during this time and are submitted to a cold wet rain or sleet they will have trouble, but if they have access to shelter, they will do fine. The cold/wet issue after shearing is really a greater one for large herds in Texas, Montana, Idaho, where they don't have access to shelter on range and a storm can blow in before the herd can be brought to shelter... in Midwestern farm flocks you can see this wouldn't be a problem--as most are no more than a few hundred yards from shelter at any time.

Can you milk angoras?

No! Angoras are the most efficient fiber producing animals on earth, producing up to 25% of their own body weight in fiber annually. They raise wonderful kids, beautiful fiber, but sorry, not enough extra milk for you too. If you are looking for a goat to provide milk, choose one of the many dairy breeds.

What Sheep Eat

Grass, clover, and forbs
Mostly sheep eat grass, clover, forbs, and other pasture plants. They especially love forbs. It is usually their first choice of food in a pasture. A forb is a broad-leaf plant other than grass. It is a flowering plant. Forbs are often very nutritious. As compared to cattle, sheep eat a greater variety of plants and select a more nutritious diet, but less so than goats.


Grazing time
Sheep will graze for an average of seven hours per day, mostly in the hours around dawn and in the late afternoon, near sunset. When supplements are fed, it is best to feed them in the middle of the day so that normal grazing patterns are not disrupted.


Different plants
Sheep in different geographic areas eat different plants. Tropical forages are usually not as nutritious as those that grow in temperate climates. Protein is often the most limiting nutrient in forages. All forages are more nutritious if they are eaten in a vegetative state.


Pasture (land) requirements
The amount of pasture or range land that it takes to feed a sheep depends upon the quality of the land (soil), the amount and distribution of rainfall, and the management of the pasture.

In dry climates, an acre (or hectare) of pasture or rangeland cannot feed as many sheep as an acre of pasture in a moist climate. An acre of pasture in the wet season (spring and fall) can support more sheep than an acre in the dry season (usually summer)

Reproductive rates and lamb growth rates are lower in arid climates than high-rainfall areas that grow more plentiful forage. As a result, wool production tends to be of greater importance in arid and semi-arid environments, as it takes less nutrition to grow good quality wool than to produce milk and raise lambs. A farmer may be able to graze ten sheep on one acre of improved pasture in Maryland, whereas one sheep could require ten acres of native range in West Texas.


Stored feed
When fresh forage is not available, sheep are usually fed stored or harvested feeds: hay, silage, green chop, or crop by-products. Hay is grass that has been mowed (cut) and cured (dried) for use as livestock feed.

Silage (short for ensilage) or haylage is green forage that has been fermented and stored in a silo or other system that keeps air out. Moldy silage can cause listeriosis in sheep. The pieces should be chopped smaller for sheep as compared to cattle.

Sometimes, pasture plants are cut, chopped, and brought to the sheep. Fresh harvested forage is called green chop. This "cut-and-carry" system of feeding is common in developing countries, where labor is not a limiting factor.


Supplementation
Grain is often fed to sheep with higher nutritional needs, such as pregnant ewes during late gestation, ewes nursing two or more lambs, and lambs with the genetic potential for rapid growth. Grain is the seed part of cereal crops such as corn, barley, wheat, and oats. Grain is not "unnatural" for sheep. They have always eaten the seeds of plants.

A protein source, such as soybean meal or cottonseed meal is usually added to the grain ration, along with vitamins and minerals to make a 100 percent nutritionally-balanced feed. Unbalanced grain rations can lead to a variety of health concerns.

Sheep love the taste of grain and can experience digestive problems if they eat too much grain too fast. Grain consumption needs to be regulated, introduced slowly and gradually increased in the diet.

Ruminants, such as sheep, should always have some roughage (fibrous feed) in their diets. at least a pound per day for sheep. Producers in many parts of the world cannot afford to feed grain to their livestock. Whereas in some parts of the U.S. and in some years, grain is a more economical source of nutrients that forage.

By-products
By-products from crop production and food processing can also be fed to sheep. This is another advantage of ruminant livestock: they can be fed products that would otherwise go to waste and/or require costly disposal. Examples of by-product feeds include soybean hulls, peanut hulls, corn gluten feed, wheat middlings, and whole cottonseed.

With more corn being used in the production of ethanol, distiller's grains are becoming a more popular (and more economcal) feedstuff for sheep and other livestock. Distiller's grains are the solids left after ethanol is made. They are also a by-product of the brewing industry. Distiller's grains can be fed wet or dry, but are usually fed dry. Distiller's grains can contain high levels of phosphorus and sulfur, so their inclusion in sheep and lamb diets is usually limited.