Livestock

Livestock are the domesticated animals that are raised in an agricultural setting to provide labor and produce diversified animal products for human consumption such as meat, eggs, milk, fur, leather, and wool. The term is sometimes used to refer solely to animals which are raised for consumption, and sometimes used to refer solely to farmed ruminants, such as cattle, sheep, and goats. Livestock production are mainly a source for farm work and human consumption.
The breeding, maintenance, slaughter and general subjugation of livestock called animal husbandry, is a part of modern agriculture and has been practiced in many cultures since humanity's transition to farming from hunter-gatherer lifestyles. Animal husbandry practices have varied widely across cultures and periods. It continues to play a major economic and cultural role in numerous communities.
Livestock farming practices have largely shifted to intensive animal farming. Intensive animal farming increases the yield of the various commercial outputs, but also negatively impacts animal welfare, the environment, and public health. In particular, beef, dairy and sheep are an outsized source of greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture.

Etymology

The word livestock was first used between 1650 and 1660, as a compound word combining the words "live" and "stock". In some periods, "cattle" and "livestock" have been used interchangeably. Over the 19th century, the meaning of livestock and cattle shifted, leading to the modern meaning of cattle referring to domesticated bovines, whilst livestock is used in a wider sense.
United States federal legislation defines the term to make specified agricultural commodities eligible or ineligible for a program or activity. For example, the Livestock Mandatory Reporting Act of 1999 defines livestock only as cattle, swine, and sheep, while the 1988 disaster assistance legislation defined the term as "cattle, sheep, goats, swine, poultry, equine animals used for food or in the production of food, fish used for food, and other animals designated by the Secretary".
Horses are considered livestock in the United States. The USDA classifies pork, veal, beef, and lamb as livestock, and all livestock as red meat. Poultry and fish are not included in the category. The latter is likely because fish products are not governed by the USDA, but by the FDA.
Deadstock is defined in contradistinction to or as the opposite of livestock as "animals that have died before slaughter, sometimes from illness or disease". It is illegal in many countries, such as Canada, to sell or process meat from dead animals for human consumption.

History

Animal-rearing originated during the cultural transition to settled farming communities from hunter-gatherer lifestyles. Animals are domesticated when their breeding and living conditions are controlled by humans. Over time, the collective behaviour, lifecycle and physiology of livestock have changed radically. Many modern farmed animals are unsuited to life in the natural world.
Dogs were domesticated early; dogs appear in Europe and the Far East from about 15,000 years ago. Goats and sheep were domesticated in multiple events sometime between 11,000 and 5,000 years ago in Southwest Asia. Pigs were domesticated by 8,500 BC in the Near East and 6,000 BC in China. Domestication of horses dates to around 4,000 BC. Cattle have been domesticated since approximately 10,500 years ago. Chickens and other poultry may have been domesticated around 7,000 BC.

Types

The term "livestock" is indistinct and may be defined narrowly or broadly. Broadly, livestock refers to any population of animals kept by humans for a useful, commercial purpose.

Animal	Ancestor	Domestication	Utilization	Picture	-
Horse	Tarpan	Eurasia	Riding, racing, carrying and pulling loads, meat, milk		-
Donkey	African wild ass	Africa	Carrying loads and draught		-
Cow	Eurasian aurochs	Eurasia	Meat, milk and draught		-
Zebu	Indian aurochs	Eurasia	Milk, meat and draught		-
Bali cattle	Banteng	SE Asia	Meat, milk and draught		-
Yak	Wild yak	Tibet	Pack animals, milk, meat and hide		-
Water buffalo	Wild water buffalo	India and SE Asia	Meat, milk and carrying loads		-
Gayal	Gaur	India and Malaysia	Carrying loads and draught		-
Sheep	Mouflon	Iran and Asia Minor	Meat, milk and fleece.		-
Goat	Bezoar ibex	Greece and Pakistan	Meat, milk and fleece		-
Reindeer	Reindeer	Eurasia	Draught, milk, flesh and hide		-
Bactrian camel	Wild Bactrian camel	Central Asia	Riding, racing, meat, milk and fur		-
Arabian camel	Thomas' camel	North Africa and SW Asia	Riding, racing, meat and milk		-
Llama	Guanaco	Andes	Pack animals, meat, fleece		-
Alpaca	vicuña	Andes	Meat, fleece		-
Domestic Pig	Wild boar	Eurasia	Meat, Companionship, truffle hunting		-
Domestic Dog	Wolf	Eurasia and North America	Companionship, hunting		-
Chicken	red junglefowl	Southeast Asia	Meat, egg
Rabbit	European rabbit	Europe	Meat, wool, fur		-
Guinea pig	Montane guinea pig	Andes	Meat		-

Micro-livestock

Micro-livestock is the term used for much-smaller animals, usually mammals. The two predominant categories are rodents and lagomorphs. Even-smaller animals are kept and raised, such as crickets and honey bees. Micro-livestock does not generally include fish or chickens.

Farming practices

Traditionally, animal husbandry was part of the subsistence farmer's way of life, producing not only the food needed by the family but also the fuel, fertiliser, clothing, transport and draught power. Killing the animal for food was a secondary consideration, and wherever possible their products, such as wool, eggs, milk and blood were harvested while the animal was still alive.
In the traditional system of transhumance, humans and livestock moved seasonally between fixed summer and winter pastures; in montane regions the summer pasture was up in the mountains, the winter pasture in the valleys.
Animals can be kept extensively or intensively. Extensive systems involve animals roaming at will, or under the supervision of a herdsman, often for their protection from predators. Ranching in the Western United States involves large herds of cattle grazing widely over public and private lands. Similar cattle stations are found in South America, Australia and other places with large areas of land and low rainfall. Ranching systems have been used for sheep, deer, ostrich, emu, llama and alpaca. In the uplands of the United Kingdom, sheep are turned out on the fells in spring and graze the abundant mountain grasses untended, being brought to lower altitudes late in the year, with supplementary feeding being provided in winter.
In rural locations, pigs and poultry can obtain much of their nutrition from scavenging, and in African communities, hens may live for months without being fed, and still produce one or two eggs a week. At the other extreme, in the more Western parts of the world, animals are often intensively managed; dairy cows may be kept in zero-grazing conditions with all their forage brought to them; beef cattle may be kept in high density feedlots; pigs may be housed in climate-controlled buildings and never go outdoors; poultry may be reared in barns and kept in cages as laying birds under lighting-controlled conditions. In between these two extremes are semi-intensive, often family-run farms where livestock graze outside for much of the year, silage or hay is made to cover the times of year when the grass stops growing, and fertiliser, feed and other inputs are bought onto the farm from outside.

Predation

Livestock farmers have often dealt with natural world animals' predation and theft by rustlers. In North America, animals such as gray wolves, grizzly bears, cougars, and coyotes are sometimes considered a threat to livestock. In Eurasia and Africa, predators include wolves, leopards, tigers, lions, dholes, Asiatic black bears, crocodiles, spotted hyenas, and other carnivores. In South America, feral dogs, jaguars, anacondas, and spectacled bears are threats to livestock. In Australia, dingoes, foxes, and wedge-tailed eagles are common predators, with an additional threat from domestic dogs who may kill in response to a hunting instinct, leaving the carcass uneaten.

Disease

Good husbandry, proper feeding, and hygiene are the main contributors to animal health on farms, bringing economic benefits through maximised production. When, despite these precautions, animals still become sick, they are treated with veterinary medicines, by the farmer and the veterinarian. In the European Union, when farmers treat the animals, they are required to follow the guidelines for treatment and to record the treatments given.
Animals are susceptible to a number of diseases and conditions that may affect their health. Some, like classical swine fever and scrapie are specific to one population of animals, while others, like foot-and-mouth disease affect all cloven-hoofed animals. Where the condition is serious, governments impose regulations on import and export, on the movement of livestock, quarantine restrictions and the reporting of suspected cases. Vaccines are available against certain diseases, and antibiotics are widely used where appropriate.
At one time, antibiotics were routinely added to certain compound foodstuffs to promote growth, but this is now considered poor practice in many countries because of the risk that it may lead to antibiotic resistance. Animals living under intensive conditions are particularly prone to internal and external parasites; increasing numbers of sea lice are affecting farmed salmon in Scotland. Reducing the parasite burdens of livestock results in increased productivity and profitability.
According to the Special Report on Climate Change and Land, livestock diseases are expected to get worse as climate change increases temperature and precipitation variability.