Stardew Valley : Livestock Guide

coop animals : chickens

• Come in brown and white at random.
• Chickens produce 1 egg every day. Brown eggs are worth slightly more. (?)
• Make them happier by petting them every day. Check the hearts on their stats to see their happiness level.
• The happier the chickens are, the higher value their eggs will be (silver/gold stars). This will translate into more valuable mayo. Maximum value chickens will produce Large Eggs. Do large eggs produce more valuable mayo?
• Eggs can be made into mayonnaise. Mayo makers can be placed inside the coop for efficiency and to save space. Build 1 mayo maker per chicken.
• Mayo can be sold for a good profit, and gifted to most villagers.
• Eggs can also be placed in the incubator in the Coop, and in 2 days, a chicken will hatch.
• Theoretically, you could make a living out of breeding chickens and selling them. However, it's a pretty slow business as the eggs take a few days to hatch, then it takes weeks for them to grow up and gain maximum hearts. It's potentially quite profitable though as you get the eggs for free from your existing chickens. Find out how to get multiple incubators.
• Specialty chickens:
  • Void Chicken: Can only be obtained through an event where a witch visits your farm overnight and leaves a void egg in your incubator. While this is rare, it happened to me twice in about 3 years of having a coop. So be patient -- it will happen! Void chickens are black and their eggs black with red spots. Aside from the appearance, they work the same as normal chickens/eggs.
  • Blue Chicken: only obtainable after you have reached Level 8 friendship with Shane. You must trigger the Level 8 friendship event where Shane shows you the blue chickens he is breeding. Then, when purchasing a chicken from Marnie, there is a 25% chance it will be a blue one. Their eggs are normal in colour and work the same as normal eggs. They are very pretty though, and if you're into chickens, they're worth going for. Unsure if you can breed them from their eggs.

coop animals : ducks

• Exactly the same as chickens in that they produce duck eggs that can be made into duck mayo. Worth slightly more than chicken mayo?
• Eggs can be hatched exactly the same as chickens.
• Once every couple of weeks they drop a duck feather. These can't be made into anything, but can be sold or gifted. All villagers like the feathers except for .

coop animals : rabbits

• You can only have rabbits once you upgrade your coop to Deluxe. (check)
• Rabbits are cute but they're pretty useless. Occasionally (once or twice a week) they will drop Wool. The wool can be made into Fabric using a loom, but it can't be sold for much, and the uses for the fabric are very limited.
• If you really want rabbits, go for it, but if you want to make more income from your animals and do more with them, you're better off with chickens and ducks.

coop animals : dinosaur

barn animals: cows

• Cows give milk. You need to have the milking bucket and apply it to the cow to milk it. It can then be drunk, sold or made into Cheese using the cheese maker.
• Cows give milk most days, but they go through periods when they don't have milk. A message will come up saying that they don't have milk today when you try to milk them. Because of this, they are not as reliably profitable as chickens are.
• If you have the 'pregnancy' option on (it's on by default), there's a small chance that a cow might give birth to a calf. In my experience it seems to happen about once a year. There's no way to force it. Therefore, it's not really possible to make a living out of breeding cows/goats/pigs.
• In general, cows and goats are more work than chickens and ducks. They must be milked, which means retrieving the bucket and following them around until you can get in the right position to milk them. Even with experience this can take a few goes. It's a lot more mucking around than it is with chickens/ducks, who just drop the eggs and you can pick them up at any time.
• On the other hand, if you take the cow/goat cheese and put it in casks so it ages to Iridium level, you can make quite a lot of money out of them. Plus, it's fun to make cheese.

barn animals: goats

• Goats work exactly the same way as cows. Is their milk worth same or more?

barn animals: sheep

• Sheep give wool when you shear them. The shears can be purchased from Marnie.
• I've never had sheep, but as far as I can tell, they're the same as rabbits -- ie pretty pointless.

barn animals: pigs

• You can only have pigs once you upgrade to the Deluxe barn.
• Pigs collect 1 Truffle every day. The truffle will appear anywhere at random on your farm.
• The happier the pig is, the the higher quality the truffle will be.
• Truffles can be made into Truffle Oil using the truffle press machine. This is a very profitable endeavour. Converting truffles into oil flattens their value however -- whether a truffle is standard, silver or gold, it only converts to a standard oil. This is still profitable, except in the case of Iridium quality truffles. These are actually worth more than truffle oil, so make sure to sell them as-is instead of converting them.
• Pigs have a chance of giving birth the same way cows/goats do.
• Farming pigs is one of the most profitable and low-effort activities. All you need to do is let them out of the barn in the morning, and collect the truffles in the evening. This leaves the whole day free for other activities, like fishing, going to the mines or just bumming around. Being a pig farmer is pretty sweet.