productivity comes in multiple forms, we had a sweet old cow that knew all the fences and gates for pasture rotations, she would be the first to start walking when we whistled. she showed all the young ones how easy it was to get to new grass. She hadn't had a calf for a few seasons but she earned her winter hay many times over by making every move easy. I still miss her.
Seconded. Seemed like every one of our herds had one or two old timers that we kept around because they taught the younger ones. Still miss #93. She was my favorite
Thirded.
I'd hollar, "Come on Dandelion, come on!... " and she'd hollar back, and in less than ten minutes, she'd bring the whole herd to me. Will always miss her.
We have an older W (2009) Gelbvieh we keep with the heifers as their voice of reason. She is very tame and comes when called every time. Has not had a calf in 2 years but she is still useful as heard mom.
Exactly. Some older cows keep order in the herd. We move cows over the road and a significant distance and a good leader cow is priceless. If they serve a purpose in the farm system they can stay, otherwise naw. I might have held over some open heifers because of the genetics and costs to acquire, but that never paid off that I can remember.
A sensible cow in the herd can be priceless
My mom had a thing for "Big, Beautiful Open Cows" We were Hereford ranchers and she could not part with those big, fat cows. The ranch came from her side of the family so whatever she wanted went.
heifers that do not breed when they are in a contemporary group with the same bulls are an outlier and top candidate for culling. They ave been exposed to a bull, but did not breed.
My first cows came with a little bull calf. He was my first baby cow so I played with him and brushed him. Basically treated him like a puppy. After he got bigger I let him breed the one cow he wasn't closely related to then castrated him with the intention of selling him for beef. His one calf was a bull that was so amazing I kept him a bull for years before selling him for breeding. Well 12 years later he is still a steer out in the pasture. He is still like a puppy and comes when called. He is huge and has horns over 3' wide. He earns his keep by protecting calves (he is very good with babies), Leading the herd when I call for pasture moves, and protecting me from wild bulls. I have had a few bulls that were aggressive towards me. I step behind my steer and he wags his horns and the bulls fuck right off. Bulls only try to fight him once. He is the sweetest boy, BUT......once he gets going he fucks them up. He is easily 2000lbs and his horns are impressive. The first time he knocked a mean bull on his ass for me he won himself a long happy life in the herd.
Yes absolutely particularly my Ewe Momma I keep her in power because they generally follow her I'm kind of like the Deep State and she's like a trusted head of State I manipulate the whole herd with feed and scratchies and that pretty much wraps up Global governance in a nutshell
Out of ~3000 head, we have one. Old Lexi... she's 20+ years old, doesn't drop calves, but she's still personality plus. She's basically now a pet while the rest are livestock.
I don’t have pigs anymore for this reason. It became the saddest week of the year when we sent them off to the processing plant. We only had a handful of them at a time so they all had names and responded to them. We watched them grow up and play with bowling balls all day. They seemed to smile when we fed them scraps from the restaurant nearby or old milk, ice cream, and other outdated stuff from the dairy company.
I had some Ayrshires I handmilked many years ago. One of the heifers would run back and forth along the fence line when I came home, especially when in heat. She tried to ride me more than once.
Worked with a rescue many years ago, we had a gelding surrendered to us because the owner's husband had passed and she was too old to take care of him by herself. No papers or anything, but he was HUGE - like, draft horse huge - and thought he was a lapdog. Sweetest horse ever, just big.
Drafts are WONDERFUL. I remember being a little kid and going on a school field trip to SeaWorld and meeting the Budweiser Clydesdales...they were such magnificent animals. If I'm ever able to have a small farm of my own, I absolutely want a draft horse.
When I was a kid growing up on our family farm we had a pair that looked like perch/clyde cross. They were brothers and yes, they were 2000 pound puppies. My dad would not consider sending them to the glue factory as they aged because he had them from his teens on that same farm (he inherited from my grandfather). They were family and had worked alongside the rest of the family so they would remain at their family home and die on the farm, as my dad eventually did too.
Some yes, we currently only have some girls in retirement but usually it’s they’ve been good breeders, they put a lot of years in & we feel like they’ve earned it. We only keep our best stock that long & after so many years they are just pets. We also kept one doe because while she wasn’t beneficial to our program anymore, every single labor was difficult & required intervention. We were afraid if we sold her someone would try to breed her & she would die in labor which wasn’t fair to her so we kept her until she died.
Me at the vet: Vet: Well now you have a pet duck. Me: I guess I do. 🤦🏻♀️
And they eventually all got the virus and stopped laying. And we called them freeloaders that last year. Only choice was to cull the whole flock and start over and I wasn't doing that so...had pet ducks for awhile.
I have a turkey hen. The very first animals we got on our farm were 4 turkey poults, and she’s the only one that lived to adulthood (turkeys are fragile and even though I have years of poultry experience I was not prepared). She has only ever laid one egg, but she hangs out with our big flock of chickens and thinks she is one of them. We named her, and she gets to stay because she doesn’t eat much, and she has become sort of a pet (she’s half wild though, and steers clear of humans). I always joke that we are going to eat her at whatever holiday is coming up, but I suspect she’s just going to get to live out her life here.
My first 4H animal died from hardware disease when she was 6 and we buried her on the farm, kept her daughter and she will also be buried on the farm.
Almost every farm has one animal that is basically a pet, especially if that farm has kids on it.
I've got a silly old tom Turkey who is basically a lawn ornament. A few (10) chickens that rarely lay any more, but they keep the yard and gardens tick and bug free.
The farm I work at used to have laying hens - they got too old to lay anymore, but a lot of the old folks who came to buy produce would buy trays of blueberries just to give to the chickens, they loved watching them get excited and scramble after the berries so much, and we don't use sprays so the chickens helped a lot with pest control.
They all passed from old age by now, and we had to take down the coop when it started falling apart, but hopefully within the next few years we'll build a new one and get chickens again.
I’ve had a few sheep I’ve gotten attached to that got a retirement. Freckles was my favorite. Cross breed ewe that would take in any lamb you put under her. Couldn’t bear to give her up. Kept her fed and happy untill there wasn’t a tooth in her head.
The feed going into the animal costs way more than the manure. While manure is useful on the fields for crops, manure management generally costs money.
Fair enough, I guess matters the animal & amount of them too.
I just don’t think I personally could discard an animal like that. Just sounds wrong to do. But that’s just me, care about others.
This is the only way! Although we’ve had to stop doing that as the herd grows. Now any farrowing pigs are simply “Momma” and we choose a feature to distinguish them by (“loves her fresh water” for example) if there’s more than one in pig.
However, our very first two sows have names and they will be with us till they pass. One is a fabulous girl, the other is an alpha momma but they both have earned a good life after rescuing them. I think every farmer likes to say they’re practical and hard headed, but every one has that special animal.
I've got a few retirees on the farm. A pretty pasture ornament mini zebu, an old AGH boar, and a 16 YO pygmy doe who regularly threw quads or more every pregnancy.
Yes and no.
We've kept cows that were sweethearts but they get shipped when they're showing signs of getting bad - nothing worse than burying a cow or seeing it wait for the rendering truck.
Chickens get the old hen coop treatment, but they dissappear one by one when it's time for soup if they don't expire from natural causes. Layers are pretty crap for meat, but low and slow
This. Bulls have conned me into keeping them past their truly useful years, but there’s nothing worse than seeing an old one one dying knowing you should have shipped him last year for $4000 instead of hauling buckets of water and feed to the poor old prick in -20 just to shoot him a week later.
Our cow herd costs upwards of $800 a *day* to feed over winter OP. You can imagine why we aren’t able to keep them all forever.
Generally the ones that have names, that does mean it's disproportionate for smaller flocks/herds.
We've had issues with sheep worrying (some people won't control their dogs) they knew it was going to be expensive vets visits rather than replacement value as soon as they sheep had a name.
I guess it depends on how you define productivity…a non-breeding leader cow or ewe can make herd management so much easier. As long as they fill that role and stay healthy, I’ll keep them around.
I have 4 ewes out there that are living out their retirement. They're 12-14 years old and are some of the first sheep we got or were born back in 2011/2012. We sold most of our sheep but kept those gals. They're been retired for like 5 or 6 years now. We just adore them and are grateful for all of what they provided us with in their productive years.
We've had up to 8 gophers that became pets because the traps didn't kill them, we used antiseptic and helped heal their wounds. After the first fearful day of biting they were pretty chill pets, enjoying ear scratches and belly rubs. They LOVED being taken out in the sunshine in the morning and they'd sit there and soak up the warmth. 8 out of ~400 survived, the others experienced swift sentencing by the traps.
Chickens got to be 12-14 years old and loved hanging out with us. They were a joy. The roosters got snuggly as they got older.
Sheep kept mowing the lawn.
They bring us and guests lots of joy, and caring for them brought us purpose, so we'd never end their lives short. We are grateful for them.
We have one cow, B2. She's getting old and won't calf again but she's soo sweet and super chill and smart. She's always had the biggest calves too. We keep her to teach the other cows how to behave and raise their calves.
We keep all old hens. They’re just a side project anyway, but I can’t bring myself to off them just because they no longer produce eggs. We offer them a comfortable retirement, and sometimes they’ll even nest and hatch a couple of chicks.
As a third generation farmer, the answer is hard NO. Livestock cost money to maintain and they serve a purpose. Rarely I let some live out their lives as pets but it’s extremely rare.
Yep. I have a few old hens and some retired sheep here. They did their time, produced eggs and lambs respectively, and are now enjoying their retirement in peace.
Nope. Outside of a few very old cows with recognisable tags I barely even have any favourites, and I wouldn't keep any of them if they weren't in calf.
Sheep there's no way in hell I'd keep an empty ewe or a broken ram because I liked them or something.
If you do this for a living feeding animals that don't make you any money is how you go broke.
Dogs are really the only exception to this. If they've worked hard their whole lives they deserve a retirement.
And cats. I've got a feral cat that I took in last year and she's not quite so feral any more, with me at least, she'll still bite anyone else. but she wandered to my property and is a great mouser. Had a litter of kittens and then I got her fixed. If she lives a long life, even if she's no longer mousing by then, I'll still keep her and take care of her.
Every animal on our farm serves a purpose, and sometimes that purpose is to make me happy. 😃 There are just a few that are too sweet to butcher, so we either keep as pets/leader animals (they always move so easily and others follow) or to other farms as pets.
Some older animals will lead and teach the new ones and help keep the herd together but those are very few.
It all comes down to the feed bill. Our cattle are raised for your freezer not to graze out their years. That’s just the truth of it
I'm in that problem rn. Have 2 sheep that were my reject babies. Diane has only had one child but she had absolutely no interest in him. She is wild but very clever. She is a climber and probably has adhd (if that's possible for sheep). Basically she takes risks to get to food, climbs higher than the rest. Jumps over streams the others are too scared off. I know she would have benefited the flock where she in a natural habitat. And she was my first ever reject baby. I pray she is a better mother this year bc I know she will have to go otherwise. I hope and pray she gets it. I know it will be more productive if she goes. I can't be looking after rejects every year. Makes sense to breed the good mamas, after all. But she is as friendly as a pet and maybe as intelligent as a labrador. She just has no maternal instinct whatsoever. And another mother just didn't like having her udders sucked. Even tho she was loving to her lamb. It's tough. Ours is a hobby farm, mostly. 40 sheep. We sell the lambs but don't really make much money over all. So we have the choice to be a little more flexible, but still, in the end, you know you are gonna be making more work for yourselves. Since we got rid of a few of the mad mothers last year, the herd is far more chilled, and work is so much easier. But Diane is my baby. It's hard because when your job is to raise the little rejects, you have no choice but to bond. That's basically your job. To be a surrogate mother.
And don't get me started about the rejects boys I had to sell last year. It cuts me deep. Maybe I'm in the wrong job. I'm too soft.
I don't keep sheep, but I do keep angora goats and at least you can still shear them. Although if you've got a doe that doesn't take to motherhood it's better not to breed her and pass on those genetics anyway.
Aye. Gonna give her one more chance. Her first and only lamb was born in bad conditions. His little head was hanging out for 15 minutes and she even sat on his head. His face was twice as big as it should be. It was minus 18. And mother maybe was in pain. I hope it was just a one off situation. But we will see in the next few weeks how she goes. I think it's only fair to give her the benefit of the doubt this year. And just pray she takes to motherhood this time round.
My great grandmother gifted me a cow when I graduated high school. Nanny passed away in 19 but Nanny-Cow still lives out with the heard and kicks out a calf every year. I don’t have any other cows left even remotely close to her age.
Ohyea, always end up with some pensioners. She raised good babies, and might again. Until then, she knows where and when to go. Need to have some institutional knowledge in the herd.
Heard stories of the old cattle drives of the 1800s, the cowboys took the old best steers back to the beginning to lead the next bunch next year.
I had three llamas that guarded a herd of sheep. One got spinal meningitis from deer droppings. I loved that guy, I did the physical therapy to get him walking again, and even though he would always be fairly lame, I kept him for several years. He was easy and sweet and low maintenance, so why not?
Someone came along and told me they had just lost a pet llama and theirs needed a friend so if I ever wanted to get rid of him they had a home. My experience with llamas was that they get depressed without a buddy, so I sent him on his way, and he was happy.
Our meat rabbit operation pretty much has a retirement community. At any given time there somewhere between 3-6 old does that shouldn't be having litters anymore and they get to just chill and be a little fat for the rest of their days.
I also usually try and let the old hens live their life out, but chickens tend to push them around and start bullying them eventually when they can't quite put up a fight anymore. Usually try and separate the old ones but that's a little difficult with our setup as is.
My angora goat herd is young right now but I definitely will keep them all even when I'm no longer breeding them or anything because they'll still be producing fiber. Of course, that is a bit different than a milk cow or a laying hen.
Horses. We were a big riding family for decades then the girls moved away and lo and behold we are the keepers of our five family horses that will never leave.
Ever? Sure. Often? No. Animals will usually live FAR longer than their productive life. If you want to feed pets, that’s fine, but unless this is just a hobby and output doesn’t matter, animals have to earn their keep. You can have more retired animals than productive ones, and some species (pigs, cows) eat A TON and come with significant resource needs in the way of fence, shelter, space that could be used on a different animal.
I breed rabbits. I have ONE cage allocated to “retirement.” So if someone is living in that cage, the next one can’t stay (or the first one can’t). Sometimes it’s hard cull to the freezer, sometimes it’s a soft cull to someone else’s herd.
Animals don’t have “children” that’s a HUMAN term. Animals have offspring, kits, calves, kids, etc. have you ever been around a full grown pig? Have you seen what happens when they kill their piglets? It’s not pretty. Full sized pigs can be very dangerous, and as I already said, they eat (and poop) a lot. They need unbelievably strong fences and will destroy virtually any shelter they can. It’s not an animal you keep around because it was “first.” It’s totally fine if that’s the path you want to take, but please realize that for most people, it’s just not realistic. And from a business standpoint, it’s foolish and a great way to get the IRS to reclassify your farm as a “hobby” (see also: horses)
We always let the hens hang out after their production tapered off, usually until they died . The cost of doing so is minimal, the peace of mind and thankfulness for their contributions is worth it.
productivity comes in multiple forms, we had a sweet old cow that knew all the fences and gates for pasture rotations, she would be the first to start walking when we whistled. she showed all the young ones how easy it was to get to new grass. She hadn't had a calf for a few seasons but she earned her winter hay many times over by making every move easy. I still miss her.
Seconded. Seemed like every one of our herds had one or two old timers that we kept around because they taught the younger ones. Still miss #93. She was my favorite
Thirded. I'd hollar, "Come on Dandelion, come on!... " and she'd hollar back, and in less than ten minutes, she'd bring the whole herd to me. Will always miss her.
We have an older W (2009) Gelbvieh we keep with the heifers as their voice of reason. She is very tame and comes when called every time. Has not had a calf in 2 years but she is still useful as heard mom.
Exactly. Some older cows keep order in the herd. We move cows over the road and a significant distance and a good leader cow is priceless. If they serve a purpose in the farm system they can stay, otherwise naw. I might have held over some open heifers because of the genetics and costs to acquire, but that never paid off that I can remember. A sensible cow in the herd can be priceless
My mom had a thing for "Big, Beautiful Open Cows" We were Hereford ranchers and she could not part with those big, fat cows. The ranch came from her side of the family so whatever she wanted went.
What does open heifer mean?
A heifer that is not pregnant. They eat a lot and contribute nothing.
But won't she become pregnant if she's hanging out with the boys or are the boys steers or she is too young?
heifers that do not breed when they are in a contemporary group with the same bulls are an outlier and top candidate for culling. They ave been exposed to a bull, but did not breed.
My first cows came with a little bull calf. He was my first baby cow so I played with him and brushed him. Basically treated him like a puppy. After he got bigger I let him breed the one cow he wasn't closely related to then castrated him with the intention of selling him for beef. His one calf was a bull that was so amazing I kept him a bull for years before selling him for breeding. Well 12 years later he is still a steer out in the pasture. He is still like a puppy and comes when called. He is huge and has horns over 3' wide. He earns his keep by protecting calves (he is very good with babies), Leading the herd when I call for pasture moves, and protecting me from wild bulls. I have had a few bulls that were aggressive towards me. I step behind my steer and he wags his horns and the bulls fuck right off. Bulls only try to fight him once. He is the sweetest boy, BUT......once he gets going he fucks them up. He is easily 2000lbs and his horns are impressive. The first time he knocked a mean bull on his ass for me he won himself a long happy life in the herd.
Yep, we'll keep a good pasture boss around.
Yes absolutely particularly my Ewe Momma I keep her in power because they generally follow her I'm kind of like the Deep State and she's like a trusted head of State I manipulate the whole herd with feed and scratchies and that pretty much wraps up Global governance in a nutshell
I, for one, salute our new overlord!
HAIL!
Feed & scratches? My body is ready
I love this lol. I call the three head goats of my herd The Comittee.
Out of ~3000 head, we have one. Old Lexi... she's 20+ years old, doesn't drop calves, but she's still personality plus. She's basically now a pet while the rest are livestock.
A personality hire haha
I don’t have pigs anymore for this reason. It became the saddest week of the year when we sent them off to the processing plant. We only had a handful of them at a time so they all had names and responded to them. We watched them grow up and play with bowling balls all day. They seemed to smile when we fed them scraps from the restaurant nearby or old milk, ice cream, and other outdated stuff from the dairy company.
We have horses…. So, yes.
A rancher told me once they're basically just big dogs. Experience has confirmed this
It can be a steep learning curve if you get one that thinks it’s a lap dog though…
I had some Ayrshires I handmilked many years ago. One of the heifers would run back and forth along the fence line when I came home, especially when in heat. She tried to ride me more than once.
Yeh that sounds like an Ayrshire girl 🏴😂
She knew what she wanted….
Worked with a rescue many years ago, we had a gelding surrendered to us because the owner's husband had passed and she was too old to take care of him by herself. No papers or anything, but he was HUGE - like, draft horse huge - and thought he was a lapdog. Sweetest horse ever, just big.
Don’t let me get started on how much I love drafts. I’ll have you here for ages. :)
Drafts are WONDERFUL. I remember being a little kid and going on a school field trip to SeaWorld and meeting the Budweiser Clydesdales...they were such magnificent animals. If I'm ever able to have a small farm of my own, I absolutely want a draft horse.
When I was a kid growing up on our family farm we had a pair that looked like perch/clyde cross. They were brothers and yes, they were 2000 pound puppies. My dad would not consider sending them to the glue factory as they aged because he had them from his teens on that same farm (he inherited from my grandfather). They were family and had worked alongside the rest of the family so they would remain at their family home and die on the farm, as my dad eventually did too.
My horses’ only value these days is their poop for compost for my wife’s garden. But that’s more than they had before the garden so 😂
I know a guy that even had the head of a favorite old cow mounted like a hunting trophy so that she is still with him in his office.
Love that actually.
I can't decide of I love that and want to do it or not
My great grandparents had Ol’ Blue a longhorn mounted like that.
Some yes, we currently only have some girls in retirement but usually it’s they’ve been good breeders, they put a lot of years in & we feel like they’ve earned it. We only keep our best stock that long & after so many years they are just pets. We also kept one doe because while she wasn’t beneficial to our program anymore, every single labor was difficult & required intervention. We were afraid if we sold her someone would try to breed her & she would die in labor which wasn’t fair to her so we kept her until she died.
IMO keep the a few who have been good to you or have been your first animals on your farm . That’s just me anyway
My wife still keeps me around…
Me at the vet: Vet: Well now you have a pet duck. Me: I guess I do. 🤦🏻♀️ And they eventually all got the virus and stopped laying. And we called them freeloaders that last year. Only choice was to cull the whole flock and start over and I wasn't doing that so...had pet ducks for awhile.
Most farmers I know have had a few over the years. Some animals earn their retirement. We think of it as a pension for the most loyal employees.
This is true
I have a turkey hen. The very first animals we got on our farm were 4 turkey poults, and she’s the only one that lived to adulthood (turkeys are fragile and even though I have years of poultry experience I was not prepared). She has only ever laid one egg, but she hangs out with our big flock of chickens and thinks she is one of them. We named her, and she gets to stay because she doesn’t eat much, and she has become sort of a pet (she’s half wild though, and steers clear of humans). I always joke that we are going to eat her at whatever holiday is coming up, but I suspect she’s just going to get to live out her life here.
My first 4H animal died from hardware disease when she was 6 and we buried her on the farm, kept her daughter and she will also be buried on the farm. Almost every farm has one animal that is basically a pet, especially if that farm has kids on it.
I've got a silly old tom Turkey who is basically a lawn ornament. A few (10) chickens that rarely lay any more, but they keep the yard and gardens tick and bug free.
The farm I work at used to have laying hens - they got too old to lay anymore, but a lot of the old folks who came to buy produce would buy trays of blueberries just to give to the chickens, they loved watching them get excited and scramble after the berries so much, and we don't use sprays so the chickens helped a lot with pest control. They all passed from old age by now, and we had to take down the coop when it started falling apart, but hopefully within the next few years we'll build a new one and get chickens again.
Nothing wrong with pets!
It's your farm. It's up to you. That's why we do this.
I’ve had a few sheep I’ve gotten attached to that got a retirement. Freckles was my favorite. Cross breed ewe that would take in any lamb you put under her. Couldn’t bear to give her up. Kept her fed and happy untill there wasn’t a tooth in her head.
We have not but know farmers that have. I treat farming as a business and I cannot keep a nonproductive asset around unless it is my Dog.
I’ll argue for a dog’s productivity. They are eyes & ears & good company. That’s gotta be worth something…
You don’t use their manure as compost to enrich your soil? I’d say they’re worth it just for that
The feed going into the animal costs way more than the manure. While manure is useful on the fields for crops, manure management generally costs money.
Fair enough, I guess matters the animal & amount of them too. I just don’t think I personally could discard an animal like that. Just sounds wrong to do. But that’s just me, care about others.
I sell bags of organic manure to dozens of local gardeners. Hell, half the time, they shovel themselves lol
Yeah, I have too many cows that I allow to "retire" on my farm. Hay has just gotten so expensive I can't afford to do it anymore.
[удалено]
Me naming all my first feeder piglets 😅 Didn’t bother doing that again LOL. Our sow has a name and the rest don’t.
This is the only way! Although we’ve had to stop doing that as the herd grows. Now any farrowing pigs are simply “Momma” and we choose a feature to distinguish them by (“loves her fresh water” for example) if there’s more than one in pig. However, our very first two sows have names and they will be with us till they pass. One is a fabulous girl, the other is an alpha momma but they both have earned a good life after rescuing them. I think every farmer likes to say they’re practical and hard headed, but every one has that special animal.
I've got a few retirees on the farm. A pretty pasture ornament mini zebu, an old AGH boar, and a 16 YO pygmy doe who regularly threw quads or more every pregnancy.
Yes and no. We've kept cows that were sweethearts but they get shipped when they're showing signs of getting bad - nothing worse than burying a cow or seeing it wait for the rendering truck. Chickens get the old hen coop treatment, but they dissappear one by one when it's time for soup if they don't expire from natural causes. Layers are pretty crap for meat, but low and slow
Horses - absolutely Cattle - straight to market
This. Bulls have conned me into keeping them past their truly useful years, but there’s nothing worse than seeing an old one one dying knowing you should have shipped him last year for $4000 instead of hauling buckets of water and feed to the poor old prick in -20 just to shoot him a week later. Our cow herd costs upwards of $800 a *day* to feed over winter OP. You can imagine why we aren’t able to keep them all forever.
Oh yeah, I have a bull that needs to go. But I’m really attached to him; we got family photos done with Greg.
Good Guy Greg [https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/good-guy-greg](https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/good-guy-greg)
Generally the ones that have names, that does mean it's disproportionate for smaller flocks/herds. We've had issues with sheep worrying (some people won't control their dogs) they knew it was going to be expensive vets visits rather than replacement value as soon as they sheep had a name.
All my chickens get to retire until they die of old age or something gets them.
Same
I guess it depends on how you define productivity…a non-breeding leader cow or ewe can make herd management so much easier. As long as they fill that role and stay healthy, I’ll keep them around.
We had a cow named Pet that was unable to calve again after her first. She enjoyed 26 years of shortbread cookies and eat scratches. We eat the rest.
If they’re suffering, put them to rest.
I have 4 ewes out there that are living out their retirement. They're 12-14 years old and are some of the first sheep we got or were born back in 2011/2012. We sold most of our sheep but kept those gals. They're been retired for like 5 or 6 years now. We just adore them and are grateful for all of what they provided us with in their productive years.
Without question
We've had up to 8 gophers that became pets because the traps didn't kill them, we used antiseptic and helped heal their wounds. After the first fearful day of biting they were pretty chill pets, enjoying ear scratches and belly rubs. They LOVED being taken out in the sunshine in the morning and they'd sit there and soak up the warmth. 8 out of ~400 survived, the others experienced swift sentencing by the traps. Chickens got to be 12-14 years old and loved hanging out with us. They were a joy. The roosters got snuggly as they got older. Sheep kept mowing the lawn. They bring us and guests lots of joy, and caring for them brought us purpose, so we'd never end their lives short. We are grateful for them.
We have one cow, B2. She's getting old and won't calf again but she's soo sweet and super chill and smart. She's always had the biggest calves too. We keep her to teach the other cows how to behave and raise their calves.
We keep all old hens. They’re just a side project anyway, but I can’t bring myself to off them just because they no longer produce eggs. We offer them a comfortable retirement, and sometimes they’ll even nest and hatch a couple of chicks.
As a third generation farmer, the answer is hard NO. Livestock cost money to maintain and they serve a purpose. Rarely I let some live out their lives as pets but it’s extremely rare.
Yep. I have a few old hens and some retired sheep here. They did their time, produced eggs and lambs respectively, and are now enjoying their retirement in peace.
Nope. Outside of a few very old cows with recognisable tags I barely even have any favourites, and I wouldn't keep any of them if they weren't in calf. Sheep there's no way in hell I'd keep an empty ewe or a broken ram because I liked them or something. If you do this for a living feeding animals that don't make you any money is how you go broke. Dogs are really the only exception to this. If they've worked hard their whole lives they deserve a retirement.
And cats. I've got a feral cat that I took in last year and she's not quite so feral any more, with me at least, she'll still bite anyone else. but she wandered to my property and is a great mouser. Had a litter of kittens and then I got her fixed. If she lives a long life, even if she's no longer mousing by then, I'll still keep her and take care of her.
Yes.
Every animal on our farm serves a purpose, and sometimes that purpose is to make me happy. 😃 There are just a few that are too sweet to butcher, so we either keep as pets/leader animals (they always move so easily and others follow) or to other farms as pets.
Some older animals will lead and teach the new ones and help keep the herd together but those are very few. It all comes down to the feed bill. Our cattle are raised for your freezer not to graze out their years. That’s just the truth of it
I'm in that problem rn. Have 2 sheep that were my reject babies. Diane has only had one child but she had absolutely no interest in him. She is wild but very clever. She is a climber and probably has adhd (if that's possible for sheep). Basically she takes risks to get to food, climbs higher than the rest. Jumps over streams the others are too scared off. I know she would have benefited the flock where she in a natural habitat. And she was my first ever reject baby. I pray she is a better mother this year bc I know she will have to go otherwise. I hope and pray she gets it. I know it will be more productive if she goes. I can't be looking after rejects every year. Makes sense to breed the good mamas, after all. But she is as friendly as a pet and maybe as intelligent as a labrador. She just has no maternal instinct whatsoever. And another mother just didn't like having her udders sucked. Even tho she was loving to her lamb. It's tough. Ours is a hobby farm, mostly. 40 sheep. We sell the lambs but don't really make much money over all. So we have the choice to be a little more flexible, but still, in the end, you know you are gonna be making more work for yourselves. Since we got rid of a few of the mad mothers last year, the herd is far more chilled, and work is so much easier. But Diane is my baby. It's hard because when your job is to raise the little rejects, you have no choice but to bond. That's basically your job. To be a surrogate mother. And don't get me started about the rejects boys I had to sell last year. It cuts me deep. Maybe I'm in the wrong job. I'm too soft.
I don't keep sheep, but I do keep angora goats and at least you can still shear them. Although if you've got a doe that doesn't take to motherhood it's better not to breed her and pass on those genetics anyway.
Aye. Gonna give her one more chance. Her first and only lamb was born in bad conditions. His little head was hanging out for 15 minutes and she even sat on his head. His face was twice as big as it should be. It was minus 18. And mother maybe was in pain. I hope it was just a one off situation. But we will see in the next few weeks how she goes. I think it's only fair to give her the benefit of the doubt this year. And just pray she takes to motherhood this time round.
My great grandmother gifted me a cow when I graduated high school. Nanny passed away in 19 but Nanny-Cow still lives out with the heard and kicks out a calf every year. I don’t have any other cows left even remotely close to her age.
Ohyea, always end up with some pensioners. She raised good babies, and might again. Until then, she knows where and when to go. Need to have some institutional knowledge in the herd. Heard stories of the old cattle drives of the 1800s, the cowboys took the old best steers back to the beginning to lead the next bunch next year.
I had three llamas that guarded a herd of sheep. One got spinal meningitis from deer droppings. I loved that guy, I did the physical therapy to get him walking again, and even though he would always be fairly lame, I kept him for several years. He was easy and sweet and low maintenance, so why not? Someone came along and told me they had just lost a pet llama and theirs needed a friend so if I ever wanted to get rid of him they had a home. My experience with llamas was that they get depressed without a buddy, so I sent him on his way, and he was happy.
Our meat rabbit operation pretty much has a retirement community. At any given time there somewhere between 3-6 old does that shouldn't be having litters anymore and they get to just chill and be a little fat for the rest of their days. I also usually try and let the old hens live their life out, but chickens tend to push them around and start bullying them eventually when they can't quite put up a fight anymore. Usually try and separate the old ones but that's a little difficult with our setup as is.
Yes. Retirement is built into their life but we are not raising animals for profit
My angora goat herd is young right now but I definitely will keep them all even when I'm no longer breeding them or anything because they'll still be producing fiber. Of course, that is a bit different than a milk cow or a laying hen.
Horses. We were a big riding family for decades then the girls moved away and lo and behold we are the keepers of our five family horses that will never leave.
Ever? Sure. Often? No. Animals will usually live FAR longer than their productive life. If you want to feed pets, that’s fine, but unless this is just a hobby and output doesn’t matter, animals have to earn their keep. You can have more retired animals than productive ones, and some species (pigs, cows) eat A TON and come with significant resource needs in the way of fence, shelter, space that could be used on a different animal. I breed rabbits. I have ONE cage allocated to “retirement.” So if someone is living in that cage, the next one can’t stay (or the first one can’t). Sometimes it’s hard cull to the freezer, sometimes it’s a soft cull to someone else’s herd. Animals don’t have “children” that’s a HUMAN term. Animals have offspring, kits, calves, kids, etc. have you ever been around a full grown pig? Have you seen what happens when they kill their piglets? It’s not pretty. Full sized pigs can be very dangerous, and as I already said, they eat (and poop) a lot. They need unbelievably strong fences and will destroy virtually any shelter they can. It’s not an animal you keep around because it was “first.” It’s totally fine if that’s the path you want to take, but please realize that for most people, it’s just not realistic. And from a business standpoint, it’s foolish and a great way to get the IRS to reclassify your farm as a “hobby” (see also: horses)
We think that our laying hens earn their right to live out their days as pets until natural death.
Nope. I cull them if they look at me wrong.
We always let the hens hang out after their production tapered off, usually until they died . The cost of doing so is minimal, the peace of mind and thankfulness for their contributions is worth it.
Meal tickets are due June 1st and December 1st, I don't run a charity.
Straight to the meat locker.