Cost of Meat Raised Through Animal Husbandry

[Eddie]

Here's a very nice breakdown on what one family managed to do with a couple of pigs.

http://farmfolly.com/2011/03/complete-costs-of-raising-pigs/

Their meat came out to $2.34/ pound. This included butchering costs.

Here's a rabbit raiser who quotes $2.33/ pound.

http://www.permies.com/t/40339/rabbits/Cost-effective-rabbits-meat (Scroll down to read the comment by Joe Camarena)

Here's some meat chicken raisers who say their cost is about $6/pound? Why so high? Because they factored in their labor as a cost, which most people don't do on these back of the napkin calculations. My math says about $1.50/pound not counting labor.

http://zombievictorygardens.com/2013/06/26/the-true-cost-of-raising-chickens-for-meat-year-3/

Raising lambs you might come out at a little over $2/pound for a dressed out carcass.

http://www.sheep101.info/201/budget.html

All these examples are from fairly recent times, and the animals were fed out with some kind of high grade store-bought feed, usually organic feed. A subsistence farmer in a place like Texas might be able to cut some costs if year round gardens and small scale corn/grain growing is part of the equation.

It's labor intensive, of course, and somebody has to be there every day working and taking care of the animals.

The take-away here is that there is a definite financial and food quality pay-off for those willing to hone their skills and get past the inevitably difficult learning years.

Back to the future.

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