Cattle farming is one profitable business idea, but raising cattle properly requires money, land and skill. Due their large size, at least you need strong fencing, water tank and grazing land for them to move around. That is why you should reconsider your resource before starting a small cattle farm business. The first thing you do is to find a reason why you want to start a small cattle farm, and you need to find a goal to have profit your small cattle farm. To help you with that, here are 10 effective ways to start a small cattle farm. Additional information, this article about how to do cattle farming for beginner could help you too.
1. Determine the Type of Cattle
Plan what kind of cattle you want to raise and what kind of farm you wish to operate, dairy cattle or beef cattle are the most popular choices. Raising up dairy cattle is much more time consuming and costly than raising beef cattle. Dairy cattle also need more equipment than dairy cattle. Or you might want to raise the a mini cow that is on the market hit as a pet, it could be a good business profit. And since they are smaller in size, the equipment you need will be much more smaller. You should read this article about how to have mini cow as pet. Don’t spend a big chunk of money for your farm for the first 2 years after you start a small cattle farm. If you want to know more about dairy cattle, you need to read things to know about dairy cow to breed
2. Try to aim for being a low-cost producer
It is a good way to start a small cattle farm, and it can be the fastest way to make money. Especially if you start with a low source of money. By being a low-cost producer, you need to choose the cattle calving date carefully. Because choosing the perfect calving date is much more important than a good marketing strategies. Cattle usually have quite long life span, and if you have a good calving management you will get a long life cattle in your small farm. These fact is on this awesome article call 10 facts to love about cows.
3. Buy Secondhanded Equipment
Buying your small cattle farm secondhanded will save a lot of fortune instead having to buy a brand new one. The example of equipment are fences and feeder. It will be great for a beginners if you buy them secondhanded, or in auction. Buy the most necessary equipment. As the time goes by, you will know what your cattle needs and be able gain some profit first before you buy another equipment.
4. Select a Good Location
You need to find a good area to raise your cattle for the next 30 years. Even though you plan to start a small cattle farm. If you have a low budget, you might want to start by renting your neighbour or good friend farm to raise your cattle. As the time goes by, when you save enough you might want to move to your ideal location. When you start your small cattle, you might want to have a small pens shelter instead a huge yard of pastures. Because when you only have a few quantity of cattle, huge area could be difficult to control.
5. Do Some Research
Before you purchase the facilities to start a small cattle farm, it will be great if you do some research first. Research any necessary equipment to raise your type of cattle could help you to not buy any unnecessary equipment. You need to analyse your current finance and what type of small cattle farm you want to raise. Fencing, watering facilities, feed bunks or bale feeders are top priorities equipment. You won’t need your own tractor or trailer if you start with a small cattle farm.
6. Research Various Breeds
After knowing what type of cattle you want to raise in your small cattle farm. You need to do another research to determine what type of breed you want, of course looking back at your budget again. Choosing the type of breed is not based on what you like, but you need to look back at your farm goals in the future.
7. Start off With a Few Heifers
When you finally choose the breed, don’t buy as many as cows as you can. You need to start with a small amount, the purpose is beside saving up the cost you can easily determine the amount of pasture that you need to serve for them every day. How many water they need, it’s an effective way to start a small cattle farm.
8. Waste Management
Waste management is all about how dispose all the unwanted thing in your farm. Composting is one of the great waste management practice that could convert all the unwanted things in your farm to something usable. If you don’t have good waste management especially for your manure, it could cause a problem for your cattle health and the water they consume. The easiest way to process your waste especially manure to turn into compost is by putting it with a few microorganism. Just put it for a week and there you have your own organic compost. It will fertilize your pasture.
9. Use Artificial Insemination Breeder
Instead of buying and raising a bull that could cost a lot money, you can breed your cattle through an artificial insemination. Artificial insemination is a very common practice in the agriculture world, it involve collecting semen to breed the animal. Then the semen will kept frozen in the straws, then a skill vet or AI (sort for artificial insemination) technician will deposit the semen to the animal in the proper time, depend on their reproduction cycle. Doing an artificial insemination could allow you to keep the cattle bloodline clear, and it will help you avoid interbreeding.
10. Keeping Good Record of Everything
Starting a small cattle farm or any farm should begin with keeping a good record of everything. Starting from finances, breeding, calving, health, vaccination, purchase, sales and all the asset on your operation. Financial record is the most important records, because it show you whether you have a good net income or loss on your cattle farm operation.
You need to treat your cattle gently, don’t use any violence with them. If you treat your cattle right, and they tend to be happy all the time, usually all the product that they produce will be on a really good quality. The milk become more sweet, and the meat become more tender and juicy. But on the contrary, if you did not treat them well, the product they produce will become bad. I hope this effective ways to start a small cattle farm will help you run your own little farm.