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Nobody likes to talk about it but it is a topic that every farmer and family/coworkers should discuss before it happens. When an animal gets stick or injures itself what do you do? I believe that most animal farmers love their animals and do not want to see them sick or injured. It can be a stressful situation and arguments and tension can run high in your family or workers during farm animal emergencies especially if you all do not know what to do. If you are just a hobby farm and your animals are more pets then livestock you may call the vet. If you are a small farmer that understands the costs of vet bills you may not feel like you have the means to call the vet every time your animals have problems. So, what do you do?
Make sure you determine if your animals are pets or livestock. If you are a family farm make sure your children know the difference. I would also say do not get too attached to your livestock animals but I think everyone has their favorite animal on the farm that they would be really sad to see sick or die. It is okay to love your livestock and you should do your best to keep them healthy. However, there are times that things happen and you have no control over the situation. It is in these situations that all you can do is your best.
Just remember that every animal farmer has dealt with sickness and death in their animals. You are not alone. Some people do not like talking about the bad things that have happen on their farm because they feel like a failure or that they failed their animals with some dumb mistake. We all make mistakes. We do not know everything but with each mistake make sure you take away from it what you have learned. That way you will be able to do better next time. We have lost animals due to ignorance. We did not know certain things, but we have learned from those sad experience. We will continue to learn with each experience to be able to take care of them better. Learn from your mistakes and do better next time.
Know the worth of your animals. If you have a really expensive animal it might be worth the hefty vet bill to keep that animal alive. But if you raise small animals that do not cost much it might not be worth the vet bill. We raise meat rabbits and will not be taking them to the vet if they get sick or have problems because it is not worth the vet bill. It may sound heartless but if you are a small farm that is trying to stay afloat financially you will understand this perspective. This does not mean we just let our rabbit suffer in their sickness or pain. We do our best to help them one way or another. Rabbits are not that expensive to replace if they die. So, consider the livestock you are raising and determine if they are worth the vet bill or the replacement bill.
Time. This does not have an outright monetary cost that you can readily see but know how to value your time or your employee's time. Is that animal really worth all the time and medication that you can give it. You might not have to call the vet and pay a vet bill but you might want to consider the cost of your time and medications you can give. If you are a small one man or woman farmer you might not have the time to offer care for a sick animal every few hours. This is where it is nice to have a family right along side you to help during the hard times. We had a goat down for about a week with listeriosis. If it had just been up to one of us we could not have done it because we have other responsibilities and one of us could not offer the care needed every few hours. But by splitting it up and everyone doing their part at the times they could the goat survived.
Know the right breeds of animals to raise. There are some breeds of animals that are more hearty then others. So, do your research for the animal you wish to raise before you get them. We did not do this with our goats and got Boer/Spanish mixes for our first does. We have since learned that the Kiko breed of goat is the best breed for hardiness and have made the switch to mostly Kikos. And since we have that experience with both breeds we can say we totally agree that the Kiko breed is easier to raise and keep alive. However, different breeds of animals will have different qualities that may be the best for you but not for someone else. How you plan to raise that animal should also play a part in determining what breed to get.
It seems like we learn new things about our animals every year. Different problems will arise and we'll have to do tons of research to learn what to do to help that animal. That is why we started doing blogs to help others learn about the things we have already experienced. Sign up for our weekly blog to learn more about taking care of your animals.
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