What do you raise and why?

[RJ6Mommy]

First off I raise kids, 6 of them to be exact. I raise them because I need a workforce to run the farm. Im only kidding we just moved to property and just started our farm so the kids were here long before we decided to raise animals.

We have 11 chickens we raise for eggs right now and in the spring we will raise so meat chickens.

We have 14 quail we get eggs from but as soon as we get our incubator we will hatch them and raise them for our freezer.

We have 5 california rabbits, 4 females and 1 male. They are do to have babies this week and next week. At least half will be for our freezer and half to sell because they are purebread with pedigrees so extra money.

We have two pigs one for our freezer and one we are raising for my brothers freezer.

We also have four lambs we are raising for three people and then one for our freezer.

We have only been here since the end of October. Our next purchases are registered dairy goats and Boers. The dairy does for milk and the boer does for meat babies. We will be breeding the dairy goats to boer bucks so we can use the for meat also. just to keep the dairy goats in meat.

The goal is to raise heritage breeds to keep them around.

[3lilbubs]

Four boys I have egg-chickens for now, next month I think... I'll have my bourbon red turkeys, a trio. Later this summer/fall we'll do meat chickens. The turkeys and the chickens are for "clean" meat that's raised humanely. I may come out even or a little more paying for the feed but I'd prefer that. Know where your food comes from, kwim? I'd really like to go in halves with another family for a butchered grass fed cow but we haven't worked it out yet. Dh wants to hunt for a wild boar rather than raise pigs. They sure stink and any bought at auction around here are sure to be sick. The last one our friends got had pneumonia that had to be cured before they could butcher it. They spent a month and a lot more money bringing it back to health and fattening it.

[missc]

RJ6Mommy, for just being there since fall you're doing good!

We raise...
2 girls and 1 boy-child - because they rock
1 pony and 1 colt - I'm not sure why, lol. To teach responsibility, I think, but I'm not sure it's working, except on dh and I! The pony won't ever leave, she is my oldest dd's and is the best pony ever. The colt is my fun mess and he's going to get saddle broke this spring.
3 house dogs - 2 because we had them (herding and hunting - 1 of them actually is a wild boar hunting dog!), 1 (smaller and younger) for a birthday present
2 LGD - to protect the farm animals. They do an awesome job!
2 barn cats - to eat the mice. .. I wish they'd eat more and wander less, but they are cool cats, for cats...
25 current chickens - layers. We have 25 chicks coming in March as replacement layers.
2 Bourbon Red Turkeys - Tom and hen left over from this past year when we raised 3 for Thanksgiving. We thought we would see if the hen would get broody. She hasn't, and we aren't into incubators, so I think they'll get culled this fall. We are getting 14 Bronze Breasted poults later this spring for Thanksgiving this year.
2 Muscovy Ducks - for bug control, meat, and eggs. The drake also will get culled this year, he's mean and possessive. We will look for probably another 2-3-5 ducklings this spring to try to get more hens.
Piglets - we don't have yet, but have 9 Berkshire/Duroc crosses coming mid-March to raise for meat. (we have 7.5 of them sold already)
Future: Beef cows (for grass-fed beef) and maybe a dairy? Also, we'll likely add meat chickens next year.
We've had the property for over 3 years now, but just built our house and moved over here this past August. Also, just seeded the pasture this past fall, so no animals on it until at least May. But it's been a fun ride so far!