#farmable

[cowboymeemaw]

This dirty little creature begging for bananas

[cowboymeemaw]

Why name your livestock?

Why do I, as a farmer who shows and raises terminal (market) stock name them?

I get this question frequently because naming these animals does make it easier to get attached, and harder to let go of. So why do I do it?

Well for a short answer first, they're animals I love. Doesn't matter if it's market or not to me, naming them make others realize they are more than just food.

Take Elton for example.

He is a market barrow, a blue butt light cross who is in my show string. His purpose to me is to show and then sell.

But he not just an object. He is a living breathing creature that I spend all my time caring for. I give him a name because I give him a life.

Before I see the profit I make off these animals, I see the animal itself. I see everything it does and how it acts. I see how giving it a name, in some sense, gives it respect. I respect my stock for living, for providing, and for listening to me (especially in show stock). So when I name them to myself I'm showing I respect this creature for living.

In a less, metaphorical sense I'll say, naming also easily allows for records to be taken. It's the same way others call their stock by tag numbers

[cowboymeemaw]

Barn Cats

Meet Fee, our residential farm lady-

This post is going to go over the importance of barn cats to our farm. Though before I do all that let's get some facts about my barns kitties.

-All my barns cats have free access to outside, the barn, and the house whenever they like. Though they have their own cat room in the barn and prefer that area.

-All barn cats are flea treated, wormed, and spayed/neutered.

-None of my barn cats are feral.

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The Importance Of Barn Cats

When you hear of barn cats, a lot of people think of pets that aren't cared for so they're thrown outside. That is infact wrong! These cats are important to the health and safety of our animals, especially our poultry.

At my land personally we tend to deal with mice issues, horribly. Mice are cute but they carry diseases that can harm our animals. They're very good at chewing into feed bags and contaminating feed, causing money loss and unusable feed.

Mice are sneaky, unfortunately sometimes we don't notice they got into the feed until it's too late. An example of this is they got into the chick feed and their feces caused the death of multiple young chickens. They also like to eat out expensive hog feed, bit the pigs usually eat them back 🤦‍♂️

And to fight back to this issue, we have Barn Cats. These cats are machines, they can successfully kill dozens of mice and prevent them from ruining feed. Ever since getting barn cats there has been a major improvement in the amount of rodents in our barns!

Other animals the cats have successfully delt with are snakes and opossums! We don't have venomous snakes but we do have egg stealers and chick eaters. These cats have successfully made it so we haven't lost anything to a snake in two years!

Now our cats don't get rid of opposums by death. Rather they just deter them from entering the property. Opposums are lovely little creatures but they do attack poultry, and their feces (if consumed by horses) can cause the horse to have a neurological issue and die.

These cats are also incredibly smart! They will kill a mouse or a bird in the feed, but completely ignore a hen and her freshly born chicks! They're able to make a respectful relationship with our livestock! Without them we'd be flushed with rodents and snakes!

[cowboymeemaw]

Ask a Gen Z Farmer

My blog is new and doesn't get much traction but if you ever had a question for a farmer (or just a question in general) my ask's are freely open! I'm willing to answer almost anything!

[cowboymeemaw]

"Not being Vegan is selfish"

"How can you eat what you raise?"

"You're insane for raising animals for food"

Eating what I raise has gotten easier over the years. That may sound harsh but there's a reason. These animals ain't know how long they're supposed to live, all they know is how good their life is. Eating or processing what you raise gives you the knowledge that this animal has had the best life. You know that these stock lived a stress free happy life.

Don't ever get me twisted. It's hard, especially when it comes to my terminal show stock. You build a connection, a one on one irreplaceable bond. It ain't never got easier letting go of them, but you get over it. The tears are temporary. There ain't enough time in the world to waste being sad over it, better to know what all you did that was good.

I don't get vegans, at all. Not once have I ever met one who truly understands what it takes to be a stock farmer.

[cowboymeemaw]

Would you be willing to show us your kitties (and maybe other animals)? 🥹

Of course! Gonna try and dive through my camera roll and see what I got

We'll start with the kitties

The ones in my other post were Fee and Batman! Photo'd here are Zz, Posiden, Midas Fortnite (OLD photo), Ethel, and an honorable Mention of Kieren Duffy. My farms named Duffy Farms after my old boy, unfortunately he's one that has passed.

Now I'll round up some photos of our other residents-

Now this is far from all of the critters we have running around, but Lord knows I ain't got photos of em all. But I'll go around and share their names

Andy Dufrense the Rooster and his girl White Chick, Miss Ma'am the broody hen, Elton John the show pig, Ted the supposed cattle dog but now a lazy bum, Nimi the horrible Holstein Steers, Cheech and Chong the turks, Buddy the Nigerian Dwarf breeding prospect buck, Tick the full grown angus Bull with dwarfism, Clark the ferret, Willow the livestock guardian, Dolly Pigeon our gilt that's gonna produce some babies next year (that photo is real old when we first got her), Then there is Brian and Brian the married African geese pair. I also have another female goose, named Brian. There's a lot more u pictured I'm just lazy.

And a little honorary mention to Misty the elderly Appaloosa who lives on my grandpa's property & Oreo the evil who also lives there.

[cowboymeemaw]

An /odd/ morning ritual I have is either staying up till sunrise - or waking up at sunrise. Then I lay in my bed with my window open (it's against the bed), and I watch my free range birds. Geese, turkeys, chickens, and ducks. They all wake up around this time and it's calming watching them just exist

+ The geese come to my window for snacks

[ovesh]

Digital Farming - Farmable

Farmable is a Norwegian agtech company founded in 2018. We accompany farmers on their digital journey by offering an easy-to-use digital tool where they will access everything they need to meet the future of farming. The only thing required to get started is a smartphone. Farmable will enable farmers to gather, organize and use their data in a way that will help improve production yields while also taking care of the environment. In this channel, you can find all our support videos on how to use our app and online-portal.