Glad we have horses!
Nana cant ride anymore guess I am just gonna have to trade a cow for a horse drawn wagon!
With the price of beef maybe i can get more than just a wagon!

https://vm.tiktok.com/ZTdm...

I've been trying to find a donkey or burro or mule for about a year now... Used to be, you'd find folks giving them away, but not now...

Donkeys are selling for $1k - $4k now, Pffft! Folks must be thinking of them as "alternative transportation."

I really need a little "manure factory" for my Victory Garden, LOL.

Meanwhile, until that happens, I'll be visiting my neighbor down the road to shovel out their barn for composting & pick meadow muffins out of their pastures for immediate use.

Goat berries tend to scatter out; chicken takes a while to build up; pig manure has to be composted for over a year...

A llama as a livestock guardian may be the best choice; llamas always put their poop in the same place each day, usually next to a gate. It doesn't burn plants, so that may be an option...

The cost of fuel for that manure factory has gone through the roof - they DEFINITELY do not want us owning animals... it makes us independant.

3 years ago, a 3 string (approx 100lb) bale of orchard grass, was $21... now, $32...

My 1100 horse goes through 55 of those in 6 months.

He produces about 30lb of manure a day. (that all goes into the veg plot to be ploughed under).

He also needs his feet trimming ever 5 weeks - $60

The vet calls 2 times a year for his shots and check his teeth - $500 a year.

You will feed 2 - 3 times and shovel poop every. single. day. No matter what the weather is, or, what your plans are.

Livestock of any variety are a big responsibility, are time consuming, and expensive. But, you will love having them and, once you do, you will not be able to imagine not having them.

Your last sentence said it all. I'm practically a vet, have worked as farrier, I do all my own shoots & float their teeth myself. When one of our dairy goats her udder on a barbed wire fence, we cleaned it, approximated edges & stapled her back together. She still milked perfectly at her next freshening...

Already, my routine is up at 5, start prepping pig food at 6 (they get a hot mash 2x/day), prep dog food at 7, then feed all at 7:30... Fill bathing places & water tubs, yadda, yadda...

The way you describe it sounds like expense & work, but if you're used to doing it all yourself, without vets, once you no longer have stock, you don't know what to do with yourself.

Indeed.

But people need to know what in involved with having animals - otherwise we end up with rescue situations... and that must be avoided whenever posdible.

My horse was a rescue, he was fortunate that there was a horseman who lived nearby, to his original breeder or he would have been dead before he was a year old.

There are those who will rush into this - then regret it.

I am glad you are experienced and knowledgeable. 😊

I wouldn't take it on if I weren't. Breaks my heart to see people spend a ton of $$$$ setting up a "homestead" when they don't even understand what's involved or the FACT that they are committing their lives to the project. You don't take vacations or weekend getaways when you have stock... You have BBQs and invite folks over.

Decades ago, I rescued an old thoroughbred mare who had been on the track... She was 38 years old & skin & bones, but we put 250 lbs on her with the hot bran mash & berries, squash & other little treats & she fattened right up!

Wouldn't attempt that nowadays... Too expensive.

Happily, I am VERY rural & my neighbors are mostly farmers, with about 1/2 of them growing hay. A 100-lb bale of coastal bermuda here is $8, with peanut hay being a bit less expensive.

I miss having goats so much! Did you know that their milk contains a short-chain fatty acid that retards progression of fibromyalgia?

Miracle juice to me.

My Pearl & baby

Goat milk was the ONLY thing that would sit on my lil brothers tummy. It helped him to thrive and kept him alive!