What do you do to cut expenses down?

[Denim Deb]

One of the horse owners out at the farm won't eat the eggs from the farm since the chickens go thru the horse poop. Doesn't make sense to me. After all, there's no poop in the eggs.

 

[rhoda_bruce]

I have 2 live traps. They like fish heads. I cook mine in a slow cooker, usually. Pretty good with BBQ sauce on sandwiches too.

Well, I try to look at all kinds of problems and turn them into assets. Right now I have a few ponds on property I stand to inherit and I'm trying to figure out how I will make use of these, in ways to put food on the table. Thinking, about trying to plant rice in one and stocking one with fish, if its not too many extra chores. I don't think I have to worry about fishing licenses if I'm on my own property, but really maybe rice would be better. I shouldn't have a problem fishing if I have a mind to. I'm completely surrounded on all sides by water, within a mile or 2 of my house.....fish shouldn't be scarse.

Going to save $ on grasscutting in the orchard soon. We putting the waterfowl in there......less feed, less gas, less work......hopefully not less ducks and geese.

Find a source for grain, closer to the origin. The feedstore will eat up all your profits, if you have to buy your feed that way. I get my grain whole from an old man near the river.....it comes straight off the ships to the grain elevator and gets bought in bulk, then transported to his barn for individual sales. It also comes by way of trains to the elevators.....gotta pass a track to get to him. The closer too the source, the cheaper the feed.

I have a little half breed dachshund for my pet. She was given to me by my neighbor. Mom is pure and Dad was a chicken killing you know what. She is trained to mingle with poultry, without attacking, but has assisted me in rounding em up or catching.....I catch; not her. Well she sounds the warning, so she is cheap security, but I save lots of $ on her, because I am doing her veternary care. I get all my info from my co-worker who is certified to work with a vet. I use heartworm med intended for a horse on my dog.....only the amount of a split pea is sufficient. I treat all illnesses in a similar way I would for my children. The only thing I don't skimp on is the flea meds. I give her the good stuff because she treats the yard and house. I can't treat the yard because it would poison the grass, which is supposed to feed my animals, so Duchess is in charge of killing the fleas. I mix human shampoo with the proper poison to make flea shampoo and I use Advantage drops. I buy drops like as if I have a 100LB dog, but I have a 15 Lb dog and a 25 Lb dog.....they share. Use your head. Its just a simple math problem. A few drops gets put on the mutt next door who shares 3 houses, so fleas are getting killed all around.
Also.......a related topic.....we participate in a spay/neuter program a few towns over. When my dog was fixed, it costed $50/female dog. We got her, her sister and mother all fixed for less than what a regular vet would have charged for just one of them.
When I get a deer, I NEVER bring it to the butcher. I might as well go to the store and buy beef, if I will give the butcher 300 to process my meat. I just turn the whole thing into stew meat. If I want sausage, I mix it myself and buy some castings. Can't justify the expense of a butcher.
I have a pre-paid cell phone and the kids taught me how cheap it is to just text all the time. I've seen $100 lasting me 5 months and that's not depriving me of talking or texting.
Favorite store is the community center, where I can get all my clothes .50 a piece. Love it. I can get nice stuff or regular, comfy work clothes, just the same. Like to buy other items in a similar fashion, if possible.

 

[Hinotori]

Frontline in large doses and you just have to count out the drops for each animal. It's not hard to do. We don't have a heartworm issue here so I don't have to do that. When we lived in Virginia Beach, I had to do that for my little schipperke. I have an australian shepherd cross, and german shepherd. They can sometimes have the sensitivity to Ivermectin as well, so until I save up money to get them tested, I keep it away from them. I do get the big bottles of it for the chickens though.

Found sutures for sale at the gun show and have a bunch of those for the chickens in case they get any wounds again. I had a couple rough roosters before and sewing up a chicken with sterilized sewing thread and needle sucks. The only boy I have now is a bit clumsy, but he tries to be gentle with the girls.

We try and feed the dogs and cats good quality food. No wheat or corn for the german shepherd. They get Kirkland (Costco Brand) dog food since it's decent price and good.

We spend some money each year to get more blueberries and fruit trees. Eventually that will pay off well.

I'm thinking of tilling a small square and planting some milo since the chickens love it so much.

 

[rhoda_bruce]

A little off topic, but I'll say it and then shut up. I've had my roos rip my girls apart. It can get ugly. I will cut off their spurs before having all my girls with gaping wounds again.

 

[Hinotori]

It was teenage boys, not a spur issue for me. I have no problem twisting off the spurs. There are only 3 girls left from that bloodline and I'm not breeding them. It all stemmed from an aggressive mean silkie cockerel and his two teenage sons. I felt so bad for the two girls they injured that morning. They are both hussies, though, and squat to easy. Current rooster is a sweetheart. He takes no for an answer and rarely hits the same girl more than once a day.



On saving money, today I bought a good portion of the christmas presents for a neice and nephew. 70 percent off lowest marked price. Was winter baby clothes. $132 regular price, I paid $26 for 10 pieces of clothing.

 

[Emerald]

Frontline in large doses and you just have to count out the drops for each animal. It's not hard to do. We don't have a heartworm issue here so I don't have to do that. When we lived in Virginia Beach, I had to do that for my little schipperke. I have an australian shepherd cross, and german shepherd. They can sometimes have the sensitivity to Ivermectin as well, so until I save up money to get them tested, I keep it away from them. I do get the big bottles of it for the chickens though.

Found sutures for sale at the gun show and have a bunch of those for the chickens in case they get any wounds again. I had a couple rough roosters before and sewing up a chicken with sterilized sewing thread and needle sucks. The only boy I have now is a bit clumsy, but he tries to be gentle with the girls.

We try and feed the dogs and cats good quality food. No wheat or corn for the german shepherd. They get Kirkland (Costco Brand) dog food since it's decent price and good.

We spend some money each year to get more blueberries and fruit trees. Eventually that will pay off well.

I'm thinking of tilling a small square and planting some milo since the chickens love it so much.

I would be a bit careful with those sutures. A person(who will remain un-named) on another forum buys sutures online in bulk that are not good enuf for surgery(just do a quick search and you will see what I mean) not that they are bad but they are not always sterile and are known to say on the sites that sell them-for practice as they are not sterile and he sells them at gun shows without telling people that they are not for surgery or even telling them to dip them in alcohol. Those kind of folks need a good I'm sure that not all prepper/survivalist/gun show guys are not that way but this guy smerked and bragged about how much money he soaked people for those sutures for their prepper stores. But I know chickens can handle a bacteria load that would probably kill us. I've washed and put on powdered tetracycline and taped up some of my gals before thinking that they wouldn't make it and they healed up great.

 

[Hinotori]

Thanks for that info. I'll remember to sterilize them. They were much cheaper than the $8 I paid for one from the vet. That one is sitting in the box, too. I had a hen that was mauled by a dog survive. I didn't think she was going to. I didn't stitch her because the worst open spot was a nasty puncture wound.

 

[Corn Woman]

I have used unwaxed dental floss to stitch up my chickens with great success, I figured if its clean enough to go in my mouth its good enough to stitch up a bird in a pinch.

 

[rhoda_bruce]

I'm not sure sterility is possible in a coop situation. At best, I'd go for medical asepsis......keep as clean as possible. But when we talking about a gaping wound, unless you just saw it happen and know for a fact that it just occured, you have to deal with healing from the inside out. In the best synerio, you can disinfect real quick, quarantine the injured bird, in a clean place, give lots of electrolytes, close the wound......weather by taping or stitching and hope for the best, but otherwise, I'd just clean, quarantine, hydrate, and plaster with some kind of wound healing ointment with antibiotic properties. I don't want to close a possible festering wound.

 

[Hinotori]

The second hen that got torn a bit I didn't stitch. Just used Vetricyn to keep it clean. That's all I did for the 4 dog injured birds. The other girl had to have two stitches to stop most of the gaping (it was about 2 inches long). The skin was stretching out and tearing more. I'd tried to let it just heal at first. I did not close the wound. Just got the edges closer together in the center so it healed quicker. I always isolate.

Heck, unless it won't stay closed, I don't care for stitches on myself. I'd rather just use a bandaid and keep it together.