Southern by choice
Herd Master
Recently we decided to try something different. Our does in milk were producing quite nicely but after talking with a few breeders that have been breeding and doing DHIR testing for 20-30 years we changed a few things.
Our 5+ year old Nubian has a little bit of a meaty udder pretty as it is it is a bit meaty. After one week of the changing of how we feed she has gone from 1 gallon a day to 1 1/2 gallons day!
We are seeing the increase on all the does! Woo Hoo!
The only question is how will it play out when I make the cheese?
The feed we have been feeding is high in fiber lower in protein. We get great yield from our milk.
Milk was from a mixture of Nubian, Lamancha, and mini-mancha both times.
1st batch- 1 gallon 3/4 -minus 1 cup yielded 3lbs 10 0r 12 oz cheese.
2nd batch- same amount of milk but yielded 3lbs
2nd batch I fell asleep and it hung a lonnnnggggg time. It was a little dry actually.
I am curious to see if we will have less yield because from what I understand the fiber makes more fat. Not sure about this so it will be interesting to see.
New feed is higher protein but much lower fiber.
Biggest issue is we really have to milk 2x day. Sometimes we will skip a night for a break but have found at least with the Nubian we can't she will cry, and has a hard time walking, and if you touch those teats they want to pour out milk so we won't take any chances with her. Don't know how we'd do a 24 hour fill on her.
Our 5+ year old Nubian has a little bit of a meaty udder pretty as it is it is a bit meaty. After one week of the changing of how we feed she has gone from 1 gallon a day to 1 1/2 gallons day!
We are seeing the increase on all the does! Woo Hoo!
The only question is how will it play out when I make the cheese?
The feed we have been feeding is high in fiber lower in protein. We get great yield from our milk.
Milk was from a mixture of Nubian, Lamancha, and mini-mancha both times.
1st batch- 1 gallon 3/4 -minus 1 cup yielded 3lbs 10 0r 12 oz cheese.
2nd batch- same amount of milk but yielded 3lbs
2nd batch I fell asleep and it hung a lonnnnggggg time. It was a little dry actually.
I am curious to see if we will have less yield because from what I understand the fiber makes more fat. Not sure about this so it will be interesting to see.
New feed is higher protein but much lower fiber.
Biggest issue is we really have to milk 2x day. Sometimes we will skip a night for a break but have found at least with the Nubian we can't she will cry, and has a hard time walking, and if you touch those teats they want to pour out milk so we won't take any chances with her. Don't know how we'd do a 24 hour fill on her.