Would you rather only one kind of animal or one per kind of animal?

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Would you rather only be able to keep one kind of animal on your homestead (only chickens or only goats) or only be able to keep one per kind of animal (1 chicken, 1 duck, 1 dog, 1 cow, etc).

For the record, I mentally had to grapple with this one for a while. Great question.

I would go with one per kind of animal. It writes off animals that need to be in groupings of 2+ because that would not be humane to keep them alone. I would definitely want my dog at the end of the day. Perhaps get a horse and a mule so they can be pasture mates in the future.

When I was thinking up this question, I hadn't thought about the animals that like to be in a group. I was more thinking variety vs volume.

I think I would go with the one kind of animal. Probably chickens.

Timothy Norton wrote:For the record, I mentally had to grapple with this one for a while. Great question.

I would go with one per kind of animal. It writes off animals that need to be in groupings of 2+ because that would not be humane to keep them alone. I would definitely want my dog at the end of the day. Perhaps get a horse and a mule so they can be pasture mates in the future.

Some of those flocky animals might be fine with other flocky animals. I have a goose with 7 ducks and 2 chickens. Everyone gets along decently. I used to have 1 chicken with 10+ ducks, and they were happy. You could potentially have 1 duck + 1 chicken + 1 goose and have a silly little flock that gets along well--especially if they're raised together.

Personally, I'd rather have just one type of animal--it's easier to learn to care for them and herd them around. But, my husband is a collector and has a bunch of most everything. I think, therefore, that I'd end up having one of each. (We have--if I actually remember them all--a neotenic salamander, an axolotl, 2 frogs, multiple different species of snails, multiple species of catfish, a crayfish, 3 gold fish, a sculpin, a guppy, 2 cats, 7 chickens, 7 ducks, and 1 goose. There's often some random insect living in a jar or container for a while. At least our kids know a lot about biology from having SO MANY critters in our house!)

Depends what you're trying to do.  A system will be forever more productive with a little bit of everything.  That was the whole point behind diverse homesteads long ago.  Every animal had a job.  Back when famine was a drought away and there were no chemicals, fuels, and fertilizers, people didn't have companion animals for fun, they all had to work.  

Cow - kept the grass down, provided milk, meat, and fertilizer
Pig - converted waste to meat, could graze on darn near anything, provided fertilizer
Chicken - eggs, meat, kept flies and other small pests in check, provided fertilizer
Goat - cleared the land, kept the brush down
Dog - protected the farm from larger predators
Cat - protected the farm from smaller pests
Horse - horsepower and conveyance

A very tough question. Although I would miss variety and having house pets and guard animals, I would have to say if I couldn't have a steady stream of eggs my body would fall into disrepair rather quickly. Fresh eggs are one of my foundational keystones of homesteading to begin with, and without them I'm not sure I want to do any of it anymore. I can do without meat and dairy, but don't take away my 3 egg omelet!

A tough question to begin with, but the more thought I give it, the more obvious the answer is: I'd rather have one per kind of animal.

I wouldn't want to miss chicken, so there'd be a chicken plus friends: a duck, a peacock and...a phasant? I'm not very keen on geese.
I adore my sheep, so to keep that one sheep company I'd add a goat and an alpaca
And I would, in a fictional situation, like to enrich my (fictionally enlarged) homestead with a horse, a donkey and a mule.
A dog (which one of the two?!!), and a cat.

Great playtime, my imagination had fun with this one!