On monday we are going to look at an old Jersey cow. She is being culled from a dairy farmers herd because she didnt take a breeding last time. Currently she has been milking for 460 days or so milking, but is still giving 3 gallons of milk a day. At first, my reaction was I didn't want her, as what we need is one that has just recently calved that has at least another 3 breeding years left. But then I thought about it. - $300 for the cow. - milk and associated stuff til she stops producing altogether. If we get at least a weeks worth of milk, that will give us around 5 gallons of butter, more then enough to last til we have our permanent cow. - 200 - 250 lbs of ground beef once she stops producing - the hide to cure, bones and scraps for the dog anything left will be composted Just in terms of the ground beef, it would be worth it, especially seems we will know that for the last few months of her life she wont receive any chemicals or such. We are going to be converting the back shed (7'x12') into a cow shed. It is high enough on the inside to build a second floor to have storage for feed and such above. It's built right on top of granite, so we are going to have to use a lot of straw and sawdust to build a layer of padding over it. We jhust have to run a power line and water line over to it and do a couple of hours work to get it in shape. It also has a big over hang roof on one side of it, that will make an excellent place to store hay out of the rain/snow.
If you want to look into cheaper feeding options I would look into some pigmey goats. They can make a gallon of milk a day and graze on much less land (1 acre is sufficient for many goats
