Buying and selling livestock doesn’t have to mean managing the expense and hassle of caring for large farm animals, and it doesn’t necessarily require a great deal of money or land to start a small-scale farm. The key to a successful breeding operation begins with choosing the right animals for your particular skill level, and buying livestock that is easy and inexpensive to properly maintain.
Before you even consider purchasing livestock, you’ll want to consider three important elements of raising animals for profit: food, water, and shelter. The first, food, will mostly impact your finances. Certain domestic animals have very specific dietary needs, and have to eat a carefully balanced diet of nutrients in order to maintain a healthy weight for breeding or slaughter. The diets of some animals, like pigs, can be supplemented with table scraps or other agricultural waste, meaning you’ll have to purchase less special feed to properly care for a pig than you would for a different animal, like a cow.
The second factor you’ll need to consider when choosing livestock is water. Though this may seem pretty evident, providing your livestock with clean, fresh water is absolutely imperative for good animal health. Not only is it inhumane to deny your livestock a proper source of drinking water, it will also significantly impact the return on your investment if a number of your animals die from waterborne illness or thirst. Water is an important consideration when purchasing livestock for more than just hydration, however. Certain types of farm animals need water or mud in order to maintain a healthy body temperature during hot weather and these animals can die without access to such wallows.
The third factor to consider when searching livestock for sale in your area is shelter. This is probably the most important element when choosing farm animals that are compatible with your lifestyle. Different varieties of livestock require vastly different spaces in which to live, and the animal you choose needs to be properly paired with the space you have available for their habitat. Large farm animals, like cows or buffalo, will require significantly more space than will goats or pigs, but the pens needed to safely house goats and pigs will have different fencing requirements than pasture-raised animals. Rabbits and chickens can be raised successfully in very small spaces, but both of these animals will need specially built hutches or coops in order to prosper. Regardless of the animal’s size or fencing requirements, all living things need some form of shelter from the elements.
Of all the farm animals available, goats, chickens, and rabbits provide the highest rates of fertility in exchange for the lowest levels of upkeep. Each of these animals has needs that are specific to their proper care, however, and the success all livestock investments is dependent upon the optimum health of the animals involved.
1. Goats
One of the most popular farm animals for sale in Sri Lanka is the goat, and with good reason. Goats are personable, intelligent, and can be easy to raise and breed. Goat meat is popular in Sri Lanka and abroad, and goat milk and cheese is highly prized for its nutritional properties.
Depending on the purpose of your livestock (meat, milk, or breeding purposes?), you’ll want to choose the breed of goat most appropriate to your needs. For milk goats, breeds like the Saanan goat are an excellent choice. Almost any breed will do for meat, including milk breeds, but the Boer goat is a particularly good breed for meat production. Boers grow quickly, they’re highly disease resistant, and they have a high fertility rate.
Goat farming can be far more profitable than raising sheep or cattle, but there are certain requirements specific to goat keeping that need to be properly addressed. Due to their high intelligence and agility, goat fencing needs to be the number one priority when building an adequate goat pasture. Goats can be kept in relatively small enclosures, like backyards or small pens, but the fence must be uniformly strong and high enough that goats cannot push through or jump over. Not only will goats test fences for structural weakness, but they will also take any opportunity to climb under them, or to climb adjacent buildings as a means of escape. For this reason, sheds and roofed shelters should be kept several feet from the fence line. Fencing in a goat paddock can be expensive, but a good fence will protect your herd from predators and keep them safely at home.
Unlike cows and sheep, goats don’t graze, but instead “browse” their paddocks for food, eating everything from grass to brambles and weeds. Goats are a natural weed-killer, and get much of the roughage they need this way, but will still require quality goat feed to acquire all the nutrients and vitamins they need for healthy breeding. Particular attention should be paid to breeding bucks, does, and baby goats, or kids, all of which need special nutrients in order to thrive.
2. Chickens
Chickens are a popular choice for home farming because they can be easily raised in a small backyard and require very little in the way of resources. Once again, depending on the purpose of your chickens, breed choice can make a difference in what kind of chicken (and how many) you select to raise. Bantams are the most common chickens, but there are a wide variety of bantam breeds and each one has its own pros and cons. Japanese Bantams are excellent for egg production and can be very friendly, but can also be flighty and troublesome. The “Polish” hen can be skittish due to a large top-knot of feathers that can sometimes grow over its eyes, but is otherwise a popular and solid breed choice.
Chickens require a coop in which to roost every evening. On average, a coop should offer 1 square meter of inside space per chicken, and about 3 square meters of space per chicken in the adjoining run. Although many people clean their coops every week or so, it is acceptable to layer chicken litter with wood shavings and food-grade Diatomaceous Earth in order to reduce coop cleanings to once or twice a year.
Chickens also require nutritionally-balanced feed and quality drinking water, but are otherwise one of the least expensive and hassle-free farm animals to maintain.
3. Rabbits
Rabbits are relatively simple to care for, require very little space, and are highly productive breeders. The best way to begin breeding rabbits is to start small, with one or two hutches, and expand as necessary. Hutches should be constructed of wood and wire, sit approximately 1 meter off the ground, and contain an ample nest box for breeding does and their litter. Male and female rabbits should be housed separately. For a successful rabbit breeding operation, one male rabbit is needed for every seven or eight breeding females.
Though the rabbit shelters are inexpensive to build or purchase, rabbits do require significant care and daily maintenance to insure their needs are adequately met. Rabbits need fresh food and water, and their cages should be properly cleaned daily to avoid illness, pests, and cross-rabbit contamination.
