One of the most valuable possessions after a SHTF scenario will be food. Guess what? Dairy farmers and cattle ranchers have a lot of food. A lot! And that food doesn't spoil soon, because it's alive. With all that food, dairy farmers and cattle ranchers can play a crucial role if the SHTF. They can vastly increase their own chances of survival, but also increase the chances of survival of many others as well.
If a SHTF scenario occurs and society will collapse, you have to realize that some people will die. Despite the fact that you may have a big role to play in a SHTF scenario, your primary concern should be the lives of your loved ones and yourself. If at any point you feel like things are getting too dangerous, you should bug out with your family to a safe place.
Here's what you can do if you are a dairy farmer with multiple cows and society is collapsing. You can gather your workers, family, and friends, and have them help with the process of securing the cows, caring for the cows, processing and preserving the meat, and trading the live cows and beef jerky. In exchange for their help, they will receive their fair share of cows and beef jerky.
When society collapses, people will loot stores for food. Once that food is gone, they will begin to branch out to food distribution centers, farms, dairies, and try their hand at hunting and fishing. If your dairy is close to a large population center, you can expect people within a week or so. If your dairy is more rural, it might be 2-5 weeks before people come looking for food.
Security is important. You'll need to arm as many people as you can and have at least a couple people on guard 24/7. You should establish a bug out location in the wilderness somewhere and send your loved ones there in advance of any danger. If vehicles are working, you should shuttle some cows to that location as well. Figure out how many cattle the bug out land can support and bring that many live cows with you. If vehicles aren't working, you can consider herding them there, but keep in mind, the longer it takes, the more dangerous it will become to be travelling on the roads. So the longer you wait to do the cattle drive, the more armed men you'll need and the more secretive you'll need to be by taking low traffic roads and going off-road as often as possible, which means, you'll want wire cutters and fence cutting tools with you.
But let's focus now on what should happen at the dairy. Once your people are together, security is established, and you've figured out the bug-out and cattle drive plan, you can begin processing meat and preparing for trade. You'll probably need to build a smokehouse and/or industrial size dehydrators. You can also use any ovens that work. As the beef jerky is made, it should be hidden in a safe place for you and your helpers. When people start arriving looking for food, you can let them know that you are willing to trade if they have helpful items that you need. You can even put up a list of all the items you think you're gonna need for this new life after the collapse. You'll essentially set up a barter post right there at your dairy. If a nearby town is relatively safe, you can consider taking beef jerky into town to trade with people.
In rare circumstances, you might work with a small town to survive together as one. Even though it sounds like a nice idea, there are many reasons why surviving in a small town is very difficult. I only recommend it if it is a small agricultural town of 500 or less, harvest is coming up real soon, plenty of non gmo seeds are available, and large population centers are far away.
For most people, you will want to bug out, once you have traded most of your cattle assets or it becomes too dangerous to stay any longer.. If it becomes too dangerous to stay any longer and you still have many head of cattle left, you should give the cows away or do whatever you can to prevent them from falling into the hands of marauding gangs that are stealing everything in sight.
If you do these things, I think you can create a bridge from civilization to survival and save many lives.
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