Beginner Livestock for Small Acreage

[cnelk]

To the OP or anyone else thinking about getting a few chickens/birds.

I finally came up with an idea for all the empty coffee containers I have!

 

[Horsepuller]

The best part about pigs is getting them in the spring and they finish before hunting season in the fall. Put them in a moveable pen mine is 10’x20’. Move it every couple days. Chickens are great but not so fun in the winter. Eggs freeze and pop.

 

[TX_Diver]

I have an unknown amount of chickens (between 20 and 50, supposedly my wife keeps track...), a donkey, 20ish sheep, 3 ducks, 5 pigs, and at times throughout the year will have turkeys and even more chickens.

They are all on about 3 acres behind the house. The pigs are in a pen and will only be there for about 6 more weeks.

Sheep are delicious. Highly recommend getting a good meat breed and keeping a small flock. Plan to feed hay through the winter and probably summer depending on the type of land. They are super easy to butcher.

Turkeys are overrated in my opinion. They get huge (like 40lbs!) and are way harder to clean than a chicken. They also take up a lot of freezer space if you raise more than 1-2 at a time. I have 10 in a freezer downstairs and it's about 290 lbs....

Ducks are delicious but also a pain to clean. I do like the eggs though which is why we still have 3 Pekins.

Chickens are great but you don't need 50. Every summer we are flooded with eggs. People at work buy them but we could get away with a lot less.

These pigs are the first 5 we've had and are easy so far. We put up a 10x30 pen with a small shelter and a bunch of hay/straw. They eat A LOT but look delicious.

Meat chickens aren't too bad. We buy like 60 day old chicks a year and raise them all at the same time then just dedicate a day to butchering/processing. That 1 day sucks but they're easy otherwise. Look up Joel Salatin chicken tractor for what we raise them in.

The donkey is a guardian animal. We also have a great pyrenes now because the donkey doesn't care about anything other than the sheep. Depending on your setup this may not be needed but plan on possums, raccoons, etc. bothering the small animals.

I have 5 chest freezers with one being an upright dedicated to aging meat (find a cheap one online (rare these days) and buy a kegerator controller to allow you to use it as a fridge to age meat. I picked mine up for $25 a few years ago and added the $30 controller for an awesome setup).

Feel free to ask any specific questions. We've had most of these animals a few years and have moved them all over the country as I travel for work.

 

[dieselchessy]

Around these parts we call that a “menagerie”.

 

[Cameron.25]

Probably another stupid question, but what do you do with your bees in the winter/wet seasons?

Well its wet here alot lol, probably one of the reasons its tough to keep bees here. We have mild winters tho. They hibernate and depending on the climate you have to make sure there isnt too much moisture in the hives and that they can stay warm enough and that the entrance to the hive is clear for when they finally do wanna come out. Other you need to make sure they have enough honey storage to eat for winter otherwise you need to give them some form of sugar depending on your climate. They basicay huddle up around the queen i think. But im pretty sure all they did besides that was check them once or twice and they borrowed my thermal monocular to look at them once a week to see where they were inside the hives. They are starting to come back out the hives again now

 

[Btaylor]

Well its wet here alot lol, probably one of the reasons its tough to keep bees here. We have mild winters tho. They hibernate and depending on the climate you have to make sure there isnt too much moisture in the hives and that they can stay warm enough and that the entrance to the hive is clear for when they finally do wanna come out. Other you need to make sure they have enough honey storage to eat for winter otherwise you need to give them some form of sugar depending on your climate. They basicay huddle up around the queen i think. But im pretty sure all they did besides that was check them once or twice and they borrowed my thermal monocular to look at them once a week to see where they were inside the hives. They are starting to come back out the hives again now

How much honey production are you getting?

 

[Cameron.25]

How much honey production are you getting?

Like i said im minimally involved, so take anything i say with a grain of salt cause its all second hand from my wife, she is super into it but has only been doing it 2 years lol. Best advice is to get with your local beekepers and they will set you straight cause every region is different. Someone said its like hunting but theres a huge difference, more beekepers in an area the better! Lol I'll ask my wife about the production tho, they get a ton but you also gotta remember to leave enough for them to eat when they arent making any or else you have to feed them

 

[rtaylor]

How much honey production are you getting?

It can vary season to season mostly depending on how much rain you get during your main nectar flow. Usually between 50-150lbs per hive.

 

[The Ri Guy]

It can vary season to season mostly depending on how much rain you get during your main nectar flow. Usually between 50-150lbs per hive.

Holy cow, really?

I read somewhere 10# per hive and 1/2 of that needs to stay with the bees for winter?

 

[Cameron.25]

She said they only took about 7-9 gallons from them this year cause they decided to have the bees remake their wax instead of continuing to use the wax that came in the bee boxes when we bought them. They didn't really keep track since they knew it was gonna be lower with the weather and the wax building. The drought/hot weather really messed with the blackberries too which is their main flower near them and will be next year too, until we get our lavender established. We should get a lot more next year either way, but we got plenty for us and enough to give a bunch away too

 

[loganwayne]

Since it has been mentioned a couple times, can you not use one type of chicken for both meat and eggs? I just assumed when they stop being productive egg layers you could butcher them for meat.

Our plan for this summer is chickens + 1 honey bee hive. Not sure what a good starting number is, was thinking maybe a dozen hens and a rooster? Rooster mainly because most of our neighbors already have them, and we have a population of short-tailed weasels that lives in our woods and I'm worried without a rooster they'll kill the hens easily.

bees can be a pain in the ass if you dont get bees that are local to your area. i also recommend to start with two hives and get packages of bees vs. a nuc. that way they already have some resources and if one hive is weak you can steal from the other to pump it back up.

 

[loganwayne]

Holy cow, really?

I read somewhere 10# per hive and 1/2 of that needs to stay with the bees for winter?

it depends how much you leave for them depending on your area. last year i pulled 80 lbs from a hive that was a new start. left a full super on it for them and checked it about 3 weeks later and added another super for them. they seem to be fine now but i wont open it back up till april/may

 

[loganwayne]

thats some of the different colors of honey we pulled last year.

 

[dieselchessy]

bees can be a pain in the ass if you dont get bees that are local to your area. i also recommend to start with two hives and get packages of bees vs. a nuc. that way they already have some resources and if one hive is weak you can steal from the other to pump it back up.

Maybe my confusion of your terminology. A package of bees dropped in a new hive on foundation(?) wouldnt have resources. A 5 frame NUC would(should) have a few frames of resources.

 

[loganwayne]

Maybe my confusion of your terminology. A package of bees dropped in a new hive on foundation(?) wouldnt have resources. A 5 frame NUC would(should) have a few frames of resources.

typically a package of bees is 3lbs of bees with a queen and a can of sugar water.
a nuc is typically 5 deep frames with same amount of bees but the frames already have brood, honey, nector stored on them.


drawing out frames takes alot of resources. A colony will consume 6 -7 times the weight in honey of the new wax produced. So for every pound of wax produced, the bees will use about 6 lbs. of honey, or between 1-2 lbs. for every frame. Plus there will be a window when you wont have any new bees being born.

 

[dieselchessy]

typically a package of bees is 3lbs of bees with a queen and a can of sugar water.
a nuc is typically 5 deep frames with same amount of bees but the frames already have brood, honey, nector stored on them.


drawing out frames takes alot of resources. A colony will consume 6 -7 times the weight in honey of the new wax produced. So for every pound of wax produced, the bees will use about 6 lbs. of honey, or between 1-2 lbs. for every frame. Plus there will be a window when you wont have any new bees being born.

So you wrote this sentence incorrectly, or my reading comprehension is failing me?

" i also recommend to start with two hives and get packages of bees vs. a nuc. that way they already have some resources"

 

[rtaylor]

Holy cow, really?

I read somewhere 10# per hive and 1/2 of that needs to stay with the bees for winter?

Yep, a strong hive can put back some serious honey. I usually try to leave about 40 lbs of honey on a hive for the winter and we have enough warm days down in the south that I can feed them if they get low on food.

 

[loganwayne]

So you wrote this sentence incorrectly, or my reading comprehension is failing me?

" i also recommend to start with two hives and get packages of bees vs. a nuc. that way they already have some resources"

your right i was typing in a hurry trying to do to many things at one time.

 

[The Ri Guy]

I'm planning on planting about a 100 yard long stretch of Fireweed for the bees and blacktail, and we have 1.75 acres of salmonberry, blackberry, and early blooming cherry trees.

Most of our neighboring properties around us have an excess of salmonberry and blackberry, but very few have flowering gardens for pollinators.

Do you guys think it would be necessary to plant more than the above before getting bees? I don't want to get them and not have enough "feed".

 

[Cameron.25]

I'm planning on planting about a 100 yard long stretch of Fireweed for the bees and blacktail, and we have 1.75 acres of salmonberry, blackberry, and early blooming cherry trees.

Most of our neighboring properties around us have an excess of salmonberry and blackberry, but very few have flowering gardens for pollinators.

Do you guys think it would be necessary to plant more than the above before getting bees? I don't want to get them and not have enough "feed".

Im no expert but if you arent planning on a ton of bees, I'd think that'd be plenty for them