Milking The Goat

Meet Opal. She's the star of my one goat, off the grid dairy. Opal is a first generation Mini Alpine. She is a wonderful little goat, and has lived her entire life on our farm.

Tonight, I'm going to go over the details of our milking routine and show you how it's done around here.






First, and probably most importantly, you need to keep your milking equipment sterile. This includes your hands, please wash the grime off before milking. I milk by hand and wish to keep contaminants to a minimum.

My milking equipment is pretty basic: milking containers, disinfectant solution, a rag to wipe off the udder, a brush to keep excess hair out of the milk, bag balm, and milk filters. Here is some of the bare bones equipment for milking, sitting on the milk stand all ready to use.




Next, I get a bowl of sweet COB for her to enjoy while I milk her. Sweet COB is corn, oats, and barley mixed together and sweetened with molasses. This keeps the goat occupied while I milk, and also keeps her in decent body condition while she is lactating. Opal is a heavy milker for such a small goat and needs these treats to maintain body condition. An added bonus is, the grain makes her produce a little bit more milk.

The COB goes into a bucket hung on the front of the milk stand.




After getting her grain ration into her bucket, I open the gate and let Opal out of her pen. She invariably runs over to the milk stand, hops up all on her own and starts eating her grain. Opal LOVES being milked-- please don't ever let someone tell you that milking an animal is'abusing' or 'raping' her. This is absolute nonsense.
Notice how in the above picture, I don't even have her hooked to her little leash. This is all of her own free will.




I brush her off with a medium bristle dandy brush first. This keeps most of the loose hair off the goat so it doesn't fall into the milk. Remember, sanitation is paramount to milk quality. If the milk gets contaminated it can take on a "goaty" taste. Normally the milk tastes very similar to cows' milk, in fact it is difficult to tell the difference between the two species' milk if properly handled and used within a reasonable amount of time.

After brushing, I put a little bit of weak disinfectant solution on a rag and wipe her teats and udder down. We don't want any stray bits of manure, hay, ect. getting into the milk. This also helps minimize bacteria.




After the prep is done I start milking. You need to squeeze the top of the teat off to trap the milk and prevent it running back up into the udder, then squeeze the milk out the end of the teat. This does take some practice to get proficient at, but the basics here are very simple.
At first you may not get much milk per squeeze. Your hands may also get sore partway through.  That is OK, you do get better at it with time! With regular milking, your hands should stop aching within a few weeks and your overall milking time will drop down to just a few minutes.




Here is the result of this evening's milking. When this is all filtered and the foam on the top is accounted for, it equals about a quart and a half (6 cups) of fresh, raw goat milk. The foam at the top of the jar does not filter properly and usually gets fed to the cat.






Now, before I do anything with the milk I finish attending to the goat. I take a smear of bag balm and wipe it on her teats to keep them soft and supple, and to prevent chapping.
Then I put the goat away and feed her a ration of high quality alfalfa hay. The goat does not like to go back home on her own, if you don't lead her back to the pen she will be raiding the turkey feeders and knocking down the fruit trees to girdle them and munch on the foliage. This is destructive, expensive and her extra snacks can give the milk a weird taste. I try to prevent this kind of goat antic at any cost!






All that's left to do now, is filter the milk and get it chilled as quickly as possible.

I put a milk filter over a one quart Mason jar and pour the milk through the filter. This insures there is no hair or bits of hay or anything foreign lurking around in my milk. It takes two jars to hold the contents of this evening's milking.


Milk ready for refrigeration

My first yogurt attempt--it exploded on me!!

After that I screw the lids on the jars, label them with the date and AM or PM milking, and refrigerate in the coldest part of the refrigerator. Believe me, the labels are necessary when you are getting this much milk. Any milk left over in my refrigerator after about a week gets made into cheese, dumped to the dogs, or mixed into the poultry feed for a nice turkey and chicken treat. And don't worry, the cat gets his share too!

I have made cheese, goat butter, and yogurt so far but my methods can still use improvement. I find that milking a goat actually is cost effective versus buying all these dairy products in the store. The feed and supplies I put into the goat cost far less than all these dairy products cost if store-bought, plus I get the satisfaction and peace of mind of knowing exactly what went into the milk products.