Eggs, meat, milk, wool, fur, feathers, and some priceless bucolic bliss. No hobby farm is complete without critters…possibly a small herd peppering the field or a microflock flapping around the hen house or pond. A single information-packed volume with everything a hobby farmer needs to know about farm animals, this new comprehensive manual to selecting, caring for, and breeding livestock brings forth the expertise of six hobby farmers, each of whom has real-life on-the-farm experience with the animals she discusses. Whether you’re contemplating adding a small herd of sheep or goats to your existing hobby farm or you’ve always wondered about the benefits of raising angora rabbits or Muscovy ducks, Livestock for Your Hobby Farm provides the kind of guidance you need to begin a herd or flock and expand your pens and fencing. With exhaustive detail, the authors offer complete coverage of chickens, ducks, goats, sheep, cattle, pigs, and rabbits, including the housing, health-care, special needs, advantages and challenges of each.
-Extensive sections devoted to the seven major farm animals, including profiles of the most popular breeds and varieties
-Detailed how-to chapters on the care, handling, feeding, health, and safety of each animal
-Special chapters devoted to the breeding and raising of young animals
-Recommendations for ways of capitalizing on your livestock’s output, from selling eggs, milk, fiber, and so forth
-Tips for troubleshooting potential problems and warding off diseases, parasites, and predators
Sue Weaver has written hundreds of articles and nine books about livestock and poultry. She is a contributing editor of Hobby Farms magazine and writes the Poultry Profiles column for Chickens magazine. She lives on a small farm in Mammoth Spring, Arkansas, with her husband and a mixed herd of goats, horses, and donkeys.
Ann Larkin Hansen has contributed articles to Mother Earth News and The Organic Broadcaster and authored The Organic Farming Manual as well as various books in the The Farm and the Farm Animals series published by Abdo and Daughters of Minneapolis.
Cherie Langlois, a freelance writer and photographer who specializes in farm, pet, and travel titles, has published hundreds of articles and is a contributing editor for Hobby Farms magazine. She is a former zookeeper and veterinary assistant and has worked with sheep, goats, chickens, and a variety of waterfowl on her five-acre farm in Washington state.
Arlie McFarlen, PhD, as the co-owner of Maveric Heritage Ranch Co. in South Dakota, works toward the saving and promoting of endangered livestock breeds. She is the author of several articles about these breeds featured in Hobby Farms magazine, Rare Breeds Journal, and Small Farm Journal.
Chris McLaughlin, a freelance writer from Northern California, has raised rabbits for two decades, including breeding and showing American Fuzzy Lops. She founded a rabbit rescue in the Sierra Foothils and worked there rehabilitating wild rabbits. She is a contributor to Urban Farm magazine and lives on a hobby farm with various species of animals.
Sue Weaver has written hundreds of articles and ten books about livestock and poultry. She is a contributing editor of Hobby Farms magazine and writes the “Poultry Profiles” column for Chickens magazine. Sue lives on a small farm in Arkansas, which she shares with her husband, a flock of Classic Cheviot sheep and a mixed herd of goats, horses large and small, a donkey who thinks she’s a horse, two llamas, a riding steer, a water buffalo, a pet razorback pig, guinea fowl, and Buckeye chickens.
