Product Description

Carol Ekarius' natural, organic approach to livestock management produces healthier animals, reduces feed and health care costs, and maximizes your profit. Includes case studies of successful farmers, nitty-gritty details of every facet of livestock farming, and fascinating insights on how to work with nature instead of against it.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #33518 in Books
• Published on: 1998-12-13
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 192 pages

Review
the quintessential primer for rural families who want to take a step toward independence and increase their earnings -Acres U.S.A.

From the Back Cover
Starting a small-scale livestock farm? First, you need this book! Yes, you can have a prosperous farm and achieve the lifestyle of your dreams -- and farming expert Carol Ekarius will show you how. Small farms can pay big dividends, Ekarius explains, but hard work alone isn't enough: Success demands knowledge and effective management. Ekarius's natural, organic approach to livestock management produces healthier animals, reduces feed and healthcare costs, and maximizes your profit. Through case studies of successful farmers, nitty-gritty details on every facet of livestock farming, and fascinating insights for working with nature instead of against it, you'll learn to make your farm thrive. Small-Scale Livestock Farming will help you: * Determine what you want from your farming life (even if your farm is simply a few backyard animals) * Choose suitable livestock * Understand housing, fencing, and feeding needs of livestock * Learn about reproducing stock and caring for your animals' health * Investigate conventional and cutting-edge market strategies * Create a complete financial and biological farm plan * Make decisions that are good for you, for your animals, and for your land

About the Author
Carol Ekarius is the author of Storey's Illustrated Guide to Poultry Breeds, Pocketful of Poultry, and several books on small-scale farming. Carol and her husband live with their many critters in Hartsel, Colorado.

Customer Reviews

Excellent, interesting discussions but zero photos!
I found the discussion on grass farming and pasturing methods to be first rate advice. Many livestock farmer wannabe's don't realize that they are, or should be, first considered as grass farmers who harvest their crop with animals instead of tractors.

Other welcome advice or comments were:

Her advice to think long and hard before investing in exotics is wise. In many occasions, she is correct when she states it was a pyramid scheme to make the first entrants rich but later followers left holding the bag.

Still, at least some discussion on exotic farming costs and likely returns could have been included for those who persist in such enterprises.

Further, the interviews with other small-scale farmers wasw, by and large, helpful.

How could this book become a five-star?

A - Include photographs of the topics and methods discussed.
B - Include a section of rabbit farming
C - Provide more detail specific to livestock housing, breeding and management practices. The scarcity of information in this section was a disappointment.
D - Prune out some of the new-age, holistic information.
E - Add further real-life examples of income/expense worksheets. Those that are included are a GREAT help.

All in all this is a terrific book in the mode of back-to-the-land books of the 70s, but a bit more mature and business-oriented. Shuttleworth (Mother Earth News) and Belanger (Countryside & Small Stock Journal) would be proud to know this author. I, as publisher of Living Among Nature Daringly am grateful to have purchased this book through Amazon.[com]

Excellent Resource
My brother gave this book to me for my birthday, and it has been great. We are new to farming, and it has helped us determine how to move forward, and to plan for our operation. We're retired, but we need this to pay some income, and that is what this book is all about, making money, but doing it so you don't screw up the land. The author has lots of excellent advice not only on caring for your animals, but also on direct marketing to get a bigger share of the consumer's dollar. She writes with a down to earth style that I really appreciate.

Is This High School Biology???
I was looking for a substantial book about small-scale livestock farming, and instead I was treated to a very basic introduction to agriculture. This book would make a great high school agriculture text, but beyond that it falls short of providing any real, useful, institutional knowledge that I was looking for. For example, in the book the author reviews basic high biology concepts such as the water cycle, the food chain, and the energy pyramid. She also reminds readers how to round up or round down. And if that were not insulting enough, she then informs readers that to be a successful farmer, you must dress like a farmer; "clean bib overalls and a straw hat, or a plaid shirt, jeans, and a cowboy hat." Give me a break. Again, if you want a simplistic, new age, farming book of little practical use by an author who has less than a decade of farming experience, this book is for you. If you want a no-frills, no-fluff, useful, dirt under your nails, John Deere farmer kind of a book, I would look elsewhere and I would suggest Gene Logsdon's The Contrary Farmer.