Milking dry run
As Abigail gets closer to
B-day (which could be now or at the end of the month), I'm easing her
into the milking routine. She needs that extra attention since, unlike
our little lap goat, Abigail isn't a big fan of being fondled. But over
the last week or so, I've gotten our pregnant goat to the point where
she doesn't mind me feeling under her belly and along her tendons and
looking under her tail as long as she's chowing down on her morning
ration. So I figured it was high time we started moving her to the milking stand before her morning OB/GYN appointment.
Although most of you will
probably think it's crazy, we're considering leaving the milking stand
on the front porch. The plus of this location is that it's far away from
manurey bedding and is thus quite clean. Plus, it's close to the fridge
and running water, making the prep and aftermath of milking easier.
On
the negative side, Lucy gets fed on this porch at the moment, and our
loyal dog is not a fan of anyone except herself and humans eating there.
As obedient as ever, Lucy did
allow the goats to usurp her porch Sunday morning, but I could tell our
dog was edgy due to the amount of split firewood she dragged off into
the yard to gnaw on. And Lucy's edginess made Abigail edgy, so our
pregnant goat didn't allow me to feel her up the way I usually do.
Meanwhile, Artemesia
proved to be even more of a problem. Our little doeling kept trying to
hop up onto the milking stand, causing Abigail to butt her off. Then the
doeling started exploring the porch, so I ended up tying her to one leg
of the milking stand. Unfortunately, I haven't been training Artemesia
to understand being tied to a leash, and so spent a lot of effort trying
to figure out why she couldn't ramble whimsically about.
So, maybe the porch wasn't such a good idea after all. Or maybe everyone just needs a few days to settle into the new routine?
In the meantime, I'm
hoping that some experienced goatkeepers will help me determine how soon
after kidding we should start milking our goat. My plan is to shut the
kids into the kidding stall
for the night, milk Abigail in the morning, then let the kids spend the
day with their mom. But when do I start milking? Various sources tell
me I should wait three days, two weeks, or much longer between kid birth
and starting to steal the kids' dinner. What do you do?
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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.
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I don't think there's a hard and fast rule about when you can start,, as long as the colostrum has switched to milk... it really depends on how many kids the goat had and how much she is producing. Like if she had 2 kids but is only giving a quart a day you may want to wait 2 weeks before you start taking milk...but if she has 1 and is milking a quart I would start sooner,,,one baby goat doesn't need a whole quart of milk...but 2 babies do for awhile. I always left kids on , then milked any extra milk in the morning and evening to evaluate if any milk was being left over. That helped me determine if the kids got enough milk. I sure didn't want to be greedy and take to much at the cost of the kids health.thats what worked for me in the years I kept them.
Anna,
This is a blog that may be of interest to you regarding your goats.
thoughtsfromfrankandfern.blogspot.com
One of her goats just had twins.
Anne
Thank you for recommending our blog, Anne. We had another set of twins this morning.
I start milking my Nubian does the day the kids are born. They still produce more than enough for the babies, plus I think it stimulates them to make more milk in the long run. When the kids are two weeks old, and the weather is not too cold, I put the babies in a pen with a dog house full of hay each evening. That is when I start to slowly introduce them to a little grain, as well. I milk the does in the morning, then let the babies out for the day. This way I get more milk, and the does continue to produce more milk to feed the babies during the day. It's a system that works well for us. I hope that helps.
Fern