The Tipping Point…..Cows!

Raising our own beef was one of the driving forces that pushed us to move out to the farm. We were living on two acres in the suburbs, and I know (thanks to The Backyard Homestead), that two acres can be enough land to raise one head of beef. We just didn’t think it would be respectful to our neighbors who were not on a “Back to the Land” kick. But, oh man, did we think about it, I mean we already had chickens, ducks, and honeybees. What’s one little calf going to matter?

We really wanted to raise our own beef and become more self-sufficient. It soon became obvious to us that if we wanted to pursue the dream of being self-sufficient, we would have either risk seriously offending our neighbors, or it was time to exit the suburbs.

When we made the move out to Misty Acres, getting a couple of bull calves was one of our top priorities and one of the most exciting changes to our life. Neither Lindsay, or myself had ever raised a cow before, and we really didn’t know much about it other than what we learned from books. This might sound silly, but getting cows was sort of like crossing the threshold of the point of no return. Once we got cows, we were committed to this chapter of our lives. When we had chickens and ducks it was easy to find someone to watch them for us when we were out of town, when we added the mini horses it still wasn’t too difficult, now add in cows, and we just took our animal care help to the next level!

We got our first two steers from my cousin’s family farm. We went down to their place and spent a wonderful weekend with them on their dairy farm. That is where we met our first two steers, Bob and the white cow. For some reason Bob got named and tagged with his name, and the other was just an unnamed white steer.  We felt bad calling him white cow, when Bob had such a proper name and all, so we did eventually name the white steer, Hank. We had Bob and Hank. We had crossed the point of no return, we officially became hobby farmers.

We learned a lot with Bob and Hank. I think the biggest thing I took away from having Bob and Hank, was having confidence with large animals and how to move them. Moving large animals can be a big obstacle when you haven’t had a lot of experience doing it.

We have had multiple bull calves and steers since then, and once, we even boarded a couple of bulls (not highly recommended). We don’t know it all when it comes to bovines, but we have learned a lot in a short time. We have dehorned, castrated, roped, herded, bottle fed, tubed calves, and given shots. We have taken our stock to the butcher, sold our stock, bought at auctions, battled scours, and experienced the death of calves. I feel like we have received a small education since we got Bob and Hank. We have enjoyed the learning process, even though all of the parts are not pleasant. Most importantly, we have learned from our missteps.

We have enjoyed the fruit of our labor, and we are one very large step forward in our desire to be self-sufficient.

-Daniel from Misty Acres

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