The American Dream takes many different forms for people, but it usually involves homeownership or having property. For some, it means having a ranch with livestock. Unfortunately, it’s more complicated than just buying multiple acres and some animals. For everything to succeed and since you now fall under the land ranch buyers, you need to find the perfect ranch for your livestock.
Residential Space
This might not matter to you that much if you intend to own a ranch as a sort of vacation home and hire others to operate the ranch. They’ll need living quarters, but the less space you need, the more room there is for livestock.
Enough Room
How many acres you need per animal on average will vary based on what kind of livestock you intend to manage. Cows are the first thing that many people think of when they hear the term livestock, but you might do anything from buffalo to alpacas. Know what they need, and do the math.
Full-Time Food
Will you be raising cattle for part of the year, only to cull and sell-off? Or are you looking at keeping a herd going all year long that perpetuates itself? Some ranches have ground cover that can regenerate itself and be a food source 12 months a year, but others might be better-suited for part-time animal occupation.
Water
Does a ranch have enough water to support a herd the size you want or have? Some areas have serious water restrictions that mean you can’t use all the water actually flowing through your property. Knowing the local environmental laws is crucial to success.
Public Land Leasing
This option is far more common in the West than anywhere else. The Bureau of Land Management can make public lands available for ranches adjoining such spaces for livestock grazing. Given that the federal government owns approximately one-third of all domestic acres, this is a chance to get affordable grazing done on land you don’t own, provided that you can find a suitable ranch bordering an accessible space, so you can move your herds.
In conclusion, your dream of owning a ranch with livestock is actually possible in every single state. Even Hawaii and Alaska have operational ranches within their borders. So, you can live anywhere you want and still run a ranch. However, you should do all you can to make sure it’s the perfect ranch for the livestock you intend to raise.
