Cow vs Sheep

[House of Rahl]

what do yall think? if you're limited on room and had to pick one, which would you go with and why? i'd assume cows are worth a lot more meat, but i duno about milk. also sheep have the added benefit of the wool, for w/e that's used on. are cows the only animal that gives large leather pelts though?

[IndigoWraithe]

Cows. They give you so much milk you won't know what to do with it. I got a mod to make cheese and ice cream cuz I got tired of churning butter. Cows are the only source of large leather.

Wool isn't all that useful, especially if you grow flax for thread and twine. Wool is good for yarn, if you want to knit. Sheep will not give you milk at nearly the rate cows do.

Haven't butchered any cows or sheep yet, so not sure on the meat, but it's a safe bet that you'll get a lot more off a cow than a sheep.

[namorufa]

I feel that recipes that require large leather are mostly unessential so I would prioritize sheep over cows. Some recipes require specifically sheep leather (sheepskin pants and vest), and I have been knitting scarves, balaclavas and legswarmers so I'm spending my winter all warm and snuggly. If you're not preparing for winter, maybe cows are fine too.

[Sage-of-Six-Mon]

You dont get large hides from deer?

Cows are cool for milk and they make other cows, but the pay off is a long long time if youre growing them for meat or offspring. Butter (calories) > all i suppose for most people.

I could see sheep being pretty big for a low loot/high pop run for winter clothes.

[Geronimo]

I would pick cows. A couple of cows will solve all your food issues. Instead of eating food, you just can drink milk.

However, you can also go with sheep and add just 1 cow. The 1 cow will feed you for years.

[Anna]

Originally posted by Vae Victis:

You dont get large hides from deer?

Nope, cows are the only source.

Cows are great for butter, but sheeps should be usable as well.

In crafting the only thing you'll miss without a cow is a large framepack.
Without a sheep - a lot more.

[House of Rahl]

i keep wondering what the milk yield difference is between the cow and sheep. logically the cow should way outpace the sheep based on it's size but such things don't always play out that way in zomboid. do yall know the average yields you've gotten when you milked your heard? i also vaguely keep wondering what we would get if we tried to interbreed between the three cow species. they only have the 3 models so far as i know so which would take priority assuming the characters would even reproduce with one another and what would that do to the meat and milk yields as a result?



wragenricht - if i only had one cow wouldn't it stop producing milk because there would be no bull to impregnate it? i thought animals wouldn't produce milk unless they've been pregnant recently.

Originally posted by stecph:

I think the term "yall" is the bottom of civilization...

lol. your contribution to the topic in its worthless state is noted. thank you for the chuckle. if you have something to contribute to the actual topic feel free to chime in.



Anna - oh? what do you miss by not having sheep? just the knitting of scarves and other such clothing items with yarn right?

[IndigoWraithe]

There's a reddit post that details a bunch of info on all of the livestock. Milk yield from sheep is lower than cows. At least in my experience with a huge farm, my sheep barely produce, but all of my cows produce a bucket a day. Both cows and sheep need to be pregnant before producing. https://www.reddit.com/r/projectzomboid/comments/1iig96g/basic_information_about_livestock/

I haven't found wool to be particularly useful, because my flax crop left me with so much thread and twine. I am not knitting anything currently, nor do I find the list of things you can knit to be particularly vital. BUT as namorufa mentioned, sheep leather can create very warm winter clothing. I haven't needed it, but if I survive til next winter, I'll make them. (Don't want to butcher any of my sheep yet).

The earliest known recorded use of the word "y'all" comes from a 1632 book written by William Lisle. Y'all's older than the US. Folks against its usage are simply ignorant.

[Anna]

Originally posted by House of Rahl:

Anna - oh? what do you miss by not having sheep? just the knitting of scarves and other such clothing items with yarn right?

Wool also allow to craft a pillow -> mattress -> propper beds. But it is probably easier with feathers.

[stecph]

Originally posted by House of Rahl:

i keep wondering what the milk yield difference is between the cow and sheep. logically the cow should way outpace the sheep based on it's size but such things don't always play out that way in zomboid. do yall know the average yields you've gotten when you milked your heard? i also vaguely keep wondering what we would get if we tried to interbreed between the three cow species. they only have the 3 models so far as i know so which would take priority assuming the characters would even reproduce with one another and what would that do to the meat and milk yields as a result?



wragenricht - if i only had one cow wouldn't it stop producing milk because there would be no bull to impregnate it? i thought animals wouldn't produce milk unless they've been pregnant recently.

Originally posted by stecph:

I think the term "yall" is the bottom of civilization...

lol. your contribution to the topic in its worthless state is noted. thank you for the chuckle. if you have something to contribute to the actual topic feel free to chime in.



Anna - oh? what do you miss by not having sheep? just the knitting of scarves and other such clothing items with yarn right?

No,i have nothing else to say,"lol" and "yall" say all there is to be said:-)) Good luck

[kris40k]

So, I had compared one run where I relied on sheep's milk, and another with cows. Back of the napkin math was at around 6 sheep I had plenty of sheep's milk for building up a stock of butter and having milk to drink every day. I would recommend 2 cows at minimum because they can grow sick and die on you, but I've had some individual cows produce 40-60 L when milked every other day.

If you are in to tailoring, being able to make yarn, thread, and cloth with sheep is nice. If you don't care about tailoring, cows are better for just producing calories for you.

[BitterSwede]

Depends 100% on what products you are using. Both give milk, though cows generally give more, and both require constant pregnancy cycles to produce milk.
Both take a fair amount of time and effort to raise for meat, but in the end, cows tend to give slightly more. At lower butchering levels, this is nearly negligible though.
Both give leather, so if it's for tailoring, this is damned near a draw.
Sheep give wool on a quite regular basis, which is probably a bit better for tailoring. It gives good insulation, but not as good protection as leather IIRC.

So for warm clothes with milk as a bonus, go for sheep.
For pretty much everything else, including consistent milk production, go for cows.

And if milk is irrelevant and you want meat and leather, go for pigs.

If you just want the food, chickens is probably your best bet. Fast to raise, fast to grow into their full meat amount and you get plenty of eggs while waiting for them to grow up. The hutch does take a bit of space, but you don't need much running-around space outside of that, so you can still keep it fairly small.

Just know that meat is not a good food source on its own. It can fill you up, but pretty much all meat is very low on both calories and fat, with sugar being near or actually non-existent. So whichever you pick, you will need to top up your nutrition with other food sources.

[JimmysTheBestCop]

GIVE US GOATS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by BitterSwede:

Just know that meat is not a good food source on its own. It can fill you up, but pretty much all meat is very low on both calories and fat, with sugar being near or actually non-existent.

I haven't tried myself yet, but i read that rabbit meat is different.

[BitterSwede]

Originally posted by wagenricht:

Originally posted by BitterSwede:

Just know that meat is not a good food source on its own. It can fill you up, but pretty much all meat is very low on both calories and fat, with sugar being near or actually non-existent.

I haven't tried myself yet, but i read that rabbit meat is different.

I went over the numbers, and here's what I found:

Rabbit, if raised and butchered, gives on average 5 pieces of Rabbit Meat of Hunger 30 at a decent skill. Each piece gives 269 calories (given the piece you got is Hunger 30). This means you get 1345 calories and 150 hunger on average for butchering a rabbit.

Same numbers for some animals:
Rabbit (for ease of viewing):
5 Rabbit Meat at Hunger 30, Cal 269
Total: Hunger 150, Cal 1345

Cow:
7 Beef at Hunger 80, Cal 440
7 Steak at Hunger 40 + Cal 220
Total: Hunger 840, Cal 4620

Sheep:
12 Mutton Chops at Hunger 30, Cal 234
Total: Hunger 600, Cal 3000

Pig:
10 Pork Chops at Hunger 30, Cal 150
10 Pork at Hunger 60, Cal 300
Total: Hunger 660, Cal 4308

Chicken:
1 Whole Chicken at Hunger 160, Cal 1495
2 Chicken Foot at Hunger 12, Cal 70
Total: Hunger 184, Cal 1635

This is assuming the player is of the same skill as the butcher who provided Knox Country with their meat, and the animal is of a comparable size with a comparable meat-to-weight ratio, but your experience will vary. The ratio between the animals is still the same though.

We can see here that rabbits are pretty much comparable to chickens. The main difference is that rabbits have 30% more fat and 60% more carbs, but at numbers that low, that's not even relevant for the game mechanics.

However, a whole rabbit WILL give you a full day's worth of calories, and you can trap rabbits. You cannot trap chickens, cows, sheep or pigs. So for long-term, non-farming food sources, rabbits is a good way to go. Level your trapping instead of your animal care and you'll get your needs met with meat alone.

[House of Rahl]

bitterswede - impressive investigation. i find it amusing that a cow that's likely 100 times the size of the rabbit or chicken is only worth 3 times the calories and in fact in smaller cuts no less. i recently looked into the calorie cost to players for basic movement (walking, running, and sprinting) and the numbers surprised me. spoiler alert - walking cost about 40% more calories than sprinting or jogging the same distance. sprinting and jogging both cost about equal amounts of calories to cover the same distance with the only difference being the stamina cost to get there. if you wanta see the full breakdown...

https://steamcommunity.com/workshop/filedetails/discussion/2907834593/596287304340233504/

if we combine the two write ups from the calorie intake and usage sides we end up with a pretty good picture of how calories work as a whole in b42 and why they're so much harder to maintain than b41. imagine if you factor in the increased calorie cost of timed activities and combat that build 42.12 added and .... yeah it gets bleak fast when we keep getting sub 100 cal whole meats and veggies to use in our stews. if someone finds a better way to stuff all this ♥♥♥♥ into a pot than a stew leme know!

so in terms of meat, sheep vs cow really isn't even worth comparing since the difference is so small and we wont be butchering them every few days to make it meaningful. then the diff between them would come down to milk production and large leather vs wool.

i've heard fishing at higher levels can also net thousands of calories but that mini game is god awful. i didn't buy a zombie game to spend about 20% of my game play time playing an incredibly low budget fishing mobile game.

mind if i ask what foods you'd recommend pairing with the meats that you were eluding to bitterswede? most of the stuff i foraged out of the forest above rosewood, so north west, was sub 30 cal per item for the mushrooms, leaks, carrots, and w/e else i managed to find. my general thought was to try to find w/e calorically dense veggies i could like potatoes or wheats or maybe rice if we can even grow that last one. figure i'll need to grow as many as i can while throwing in churned butter to cover the difference since i think only minmaxing in this way is going to maintain my weight. i want to play primarily combat oriented and maintaining my safe zone within a high population town or city. i play with 2x the zombie population compared to apocalypse. i plan to stay in rosewood till i get stronger then go to irving and maybe finally to luisville to maintain the pressure despite the increased ease of bringing down our moaning neighbors from leveling up. i don't think most of our primary draws to zomboid were the farmville aspect, though in moderation it's a nice touch of realism so long as it doesn't interfere with the game play loop.

once again thanks for the breakdown bitterswede.