Motorhead Mike!

[Steve Wood]

Goats bring a lot of money down here these days...due to the ethnic market I assume, but a decent  60 lb kid meat goat can bring over 300$ down here during peak market conditions although 200 is more common..  Unfortunately, they are a pain in the neck because they always want to find out what is on the other side of the fence and they are always jumping over, climbing under, or making their own opening in the fence.  The meat is very good and the milk from a milk goat is very good and makes great chocolate milk if one wants to have to milk them LOL  I have about half goats and half hair sheep and the hair sheep don't tend to have the wanderlust of goats and being hair sheep, they don't need to be sheared.  They don't need to be treated for stomach parasites frequently like goats do in a wet climate.  They sell for less but are easier to contain and they love shorter weeds like wool sheep.  I think the meat tastes very good...seems a little "sweeter" than the convention wool sheep.

I am not very conservative compared  to most in my area.  I don't care about color, gender preference, religion, on religion, and so on, but like, most old people, I fear the degradation of society and the unwillingness of the young to work.  They tend to espouse the welfare society.

The government seems to want us all to congregate to the urban areas and leave the countryside to the rich.  Probably something to do with methane emissions, or maybe it is easier to control cities.

If the economy continues to crash, those in the country are far better enabled to take care of themselves with a bit of foresight.  One needs a supply of water, a garden, chickens, sheep, or goats, a pig or two and the willingness to work...organiz ation really helps.  I think like minded people will barter goods and services and help one another out.

Of course, one and those other like minded people need to be prepared to defend what they have.  The welfare minded may be spilling out of the cities looking for free stuff and it's probably a good idea not to advertise what you have.

Preparation, while we have time, is everything.

[gnonyx]

Hi Steve hope all is well with you but then again letting us know how to live the long life like you now I have to look into goats meat. 
I hope the goats like the afternoon feeding since I'm not a morning person, too many years of doing the early shift and now I start to function late morning at best. I guess I would have to invest in a automatic feeder, and several of the Robot Cleaners.
You're still the man

[Steve Wood]

Julio, they are a creature of habit.  They will be there whatever time you feed them if you are consistent with the time.  I am okay, I nap a lot easier than I used to.  I am not motivated to stay active, but,  you must stay that way in order to keep being spry LOL

[motorhead]

Steve,

Thanks for all the insight. Our research has also shown that hair goats/sheep are the way to go too. The meat and milk benefit is there, as are their characteristic s as you pointed out. The funny part is how to get them to get produce milk (breeding), and then keeping them producing milk (by perpetually milking them). Penning them for safety (we have foxes and coyotes roaming the yard) and grazing, and keeping them warm in the winter, are serious issues.  Under the current situation I am working from home so I can definitely care for them on the daily.

Our garden over produced last year, not a bad problem to have... we just weren't prepared to redistribute or store it (although Natasha did make ketchup and froze it). Metric tonne of potatoes made for lots of French fries.

We were looking into a well when we moved in, its on the backburner for now. We do have two sloughs on the property and they hold water for a good part of the Spring and Summer.  I took my firearms license course this past Summer, but have been stuck in limbo waiting for it to come back so that I can start hunting. Never wanted/needed a personal firearm before moving here. My Brother-in-Law is an avid hunter and just bagged a deer last week. We just finished eating the pork/venison. So jealous.

The advantage of moving to Montana of the North is there is a huge emphasis on community and self-reliance. In short, everyone here does something of value, and whatever they don't do they know someone who does.

[Steve Wood]

Mike, you have always had a broad range of interests and that should suit you well.

There are a few jillion things you can do but you cannot do them all, imo.  I think one has to consider a broader cooperative effort if one seeks to thrive rather than survive.  It is difficult to manage a number of things when things such as potatoes tend to overwhelm one quickly.

It is much easier to discuss theory of how things should be than it is to form an associated group of like minded people.  It would be nice if some could concentrate on certain things such as raising sheep and goats and another could perform such duties as butcher, etc.  One has to think broadly in the longer term and more narrow in the short, I suspect.  If it were easy, we would all write books and get rich on YT channels LOL

I would not be at all surprised to find that there were still people around with root cellars and many jars filled with canning products.  As we tend to have both members of the couple working full time, it gets even harder, but that may be easier to cope with when one works from home which is only to be more common now that so many do.

I have worked in both Canada and Alaska and I noticed as I went out of the urban areas into the countryside that there were areas that were often populated by family members that lived quite well most of the year from products of the land-both agricultural and hunting/live stock.  It was not as easy as drawing a paycheck and going to the grocery store/mall, but strangely, most of them seemed to be a lot happier than ordinary people.

I am one of these people that believe that buying food commercially is one of the things that lead to more sickness than I recall from my youth.  Everything is so packed with chemical additives, etc that I believe people no longer build natural immunities that we old farts derived from playing in the dirt.  I doubt that most scientists agree with me.  On the other hand, I think most scientists are impersonators riding on the coat tail of peer review.

One of the problems with goats and sheep is the threat of coyotes killing everything that is produced.  A couple of Great Pyrenees guard dogs with prevent that problem as well as insure the safety of your kids from roving predators.  They are ideally suited for the climate as well.

Water is easily purified as long as you have a source of raw water.  A back up energy plan is a necessity.  I don't know how solid your supply is but I know that the energy grid is way under capacity for sudden loads down here and it is very vulnerable to outside problems.

As I think I suggested before, being prepared is not a simple, do this plan and all will be right.  First one has to focus on doing things right and that suggests on narrowing efforts to build that foundation before adding multiple stores to the structure.

No one size fits all and there will be no final exam other surviving and surviving well.  You know, Live Long and Prosper!

 

[Steve Wood]

I have learned to go to cross-bred stock as they are far more hardy and are often much better mothers particularly with goats.  Most of my goats are crossbred Boer and Spanish goats.  They tend to have the best traits of both.  My sheep are mostly Dorper with a few others mixed in along the way.

Goats tend to reproduce once a year and grow slower initially but they may bring 50% or so more per pound.  The hair sheep reproduce every seven months are so and grow faster initially so they may go to market in about 60% of the time.  I notice this used to be heavily goat and wool sheep country but there seems to be a lot more hair sheep these days.  I think the sheep are better mothers.

I am not sure what the choice in hair sheep is up there.  I would guess the market is pretty good in Canada due to the influx of immigrants that prefer goats and sheep as a food meat.

I am attaching a pic of two kids that were born just in front of my house this morning.  They are about 45 minutes old.

[motorhead]

We bought a tri-fuel generator this summer for some redundancy. Between natural gas and gasoline we should have plenty of fuel for a while (especially with six cars worth of fuel on hand). I guess I can always rob a propane tank out of the TBSS too.  Lots of standing water on the property between November and April... long term storage (dugout) TBD.

We've been eating organic and whole foods as much as possible for years. Natasha really got into gardening after our girls started wiping their own butts so that has meant far fewer chemicals in our diets. We are baking more breads and such as well... helps that our girls are now capable of operating things in the kitchen. The more they contribute the more time I have for other things... like working on my cars... I mean... fortifying our homestead.

I picked the girls up a pellet gun in the Spring and taught them the principles of marksmanship. I'll probably set them out to eradicate the prairie dogs and magpies next year. So long as they clean up the corpses. And they've fired some small gauge shotguns at some clay pigeons at their Uncle's place. Hopefully they graduate to deer in a few years.

In summary: cities suuuuuuuck.

[Steve Wood]

Agreed😔