Milking station

mystang89

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Since I finally finished my lean to I have a place to milk my sheep but I don't have any clue of how to build a hand milking station, what is important in the construction or anything else. Anyone have pics for me or things they wished they had included when building theirs? Things that people believe to be importantly?
 

Devonviolet

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We built our milk stand out of 2x4s and a platform from expanded metal platform, to allow spilled fluids to go through to the ground. However, many people use treated plywood, or 1x4s, with small gaps, and that is fine.

You could also use pallet wood, instead of 2x4s, to keep the cost down.

Here are a couple pics of our milk, stand, that my DH built:
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This is a cute shot of our LaMancha dairy goat, with her daughter, Hope.
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Your sheep may be shorter and have a fatter neck, due to thick wool. So, you might want to make some adjustments to the stanchion (the part that holds the head in place.

Here is a link to some plans, that might help you get started.
https://www.thegoatspot.net/threads/stanchion-or-milking-stand-insctuctions.135000/
 
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mystang89

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Thank you! That's exactly what I'm trying to find. I've never milked an animal before....I've never milked a human before either now that I think about it, but is there a lot of lost milk when doing it by hand? Do your goats that aren't used to being milked fight when they are trapped in the stanchion? Do they fight and if so do they fight enough where you think they might break the wood of the stanchion?
 

Devonviolet

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I’ve never milked sheep before, but I suspect it is similar to milking goats..

No, I don’t lose any milk when I’m milking, except for a stray squirt, here and there. I milk into a stainless steel bucket.

When I first started milking Falina, it was her first time being milked, and she tended to kick, trying to get me to leave her alone. I tried holding her leg, so she wouldn’t put her back foot in the milk . . . Which does happen on occasion. We ended up using ropes to hobble her back legs.

After a few months, i tried taking them off, and it was better. She still wasn’t crazy about being milked, but she still occasionally tried to kick my hands away. I was advised that I am the boss and if she doesn’t like it, she will have to learn to accept it. Sort of like teenagers. A couple months I tried taking the hobble off again, and she was fine with it. This is her second year, and she is totally fine with me milking her. I have actually gotten to the point that I enjoy milking her.

In the beginning, I was most comfortable using my right hand, (one side at a time), as that was my strongest hand. Eventually, I began to try using both hands at the same time. That was really clumsy at first. As time went by, I persevered, and now, I feel most comfortable using both hands. And it goes a LOT faster doing it that way.
 

Wehner Homestead

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Milk Stand #1: DH built...I required tall for my height, any easy moving head catch that I picked the chain and hook for, board spacing needed to allow for anything to flow through if necessary, big enough platform for me and a Nigerian Dwarf and a human kid or two, a feeder hook, and a step to allow the goats to jump up easier.

He finished the initial part first then made some adjustment changes to the head catch to make it a bit wider, he couldn’t get the feeder close enough for my small goats so he took off the board it hooked over/sawed off the hook ledge on the feeder/screwed the feeder to the stop board in the front, the step was added later. I was only milking one Nigie at the time so I just lifted her up.

I’m still not happy with the feeder as I can’t take t off to clean it out. Haven’t come up with what we feel is a good solution for this yet but haven’t stressed about it either.

One of the first times using it. This was with the initial board to hook the feeder over.
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View from side-rear without a goat on the stand. Before modifications.
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Shows the feeder attached with screws.
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Closer view of the head catch.
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Step installed. I can step on it and it doesn’t tip. Queenie can too. It tips up when DH steps on it. Makes a nice seat for human kids and a way for them to get up too. He put a kickboard on to not have to worry about hooves or feet slipping through.
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Milk Stand 2: Planning in progress. We’ve added 2 Lamanchas and a Nubian with plans of breeding to milk so...I need a stand to handle their size. The head stand on the one above is too short.

We hope to come up with a better concept for the feeder on this stand. I’m happy with the concept for the overall headstand, it just needs to be built for a bigger goat.

Does that have just freshened don’t jump very well so this is a problem that we’ve found with our first stand also. This stand will be built lower to the ground, probably step height of the first, and have a ramp.

This stand will need to work for the Standard size goats, Minis, and Nigies.

Stand 3: Planned replica of Stand 2, other than no ramp, just a short jump. Won’t be built until after Stand 2 can be trialed and additional changes made, if indicated.

We may turn into an actual dairy so I don’t know how many stands we will end up with or if we will do a platform at that point.
 

mystang89

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While I'm on the subject of milking.....my wife and I have been searching online for bags to put the excess milk in a freeze it but haven't had luck finding any. What do you all do with the excess milk and how do you store it?
 

Wehner Homestead

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I’m trialing several things currently. I have some frozen in gallon cow milk plastic jugs and some in quart ziploc freezer bags. I’ll try to update you!
 

Devonviolet

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When I want/need to freeze milk I use 1 gallon zip lock freezer bags. I only put 1/2 gallon of milk in the bag, zip it up, squeezing out as much air as I can. Then I lay the bag flat on a cookie sheet, in the freezer until frozen. Then we store the bags, standing vertical in a plastic storage box. We can store quite a bit of milk in the freezer that way.

However, I use our milk to make cheese, (Mozzarella, Feta, and Chevré). I also make Kefir. So, I don't freeze a lot of milk, unless we are getting ready to dry off our goats, for freshening.
 
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Ridgetop

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I used to freeze my milk but it took up all the freezer space - and we have 3 freezers and 2 refrigerator/freezers! After a while I only froze the colostrum. I used gallon freezer ziplock bags. WARNING! Make sure you put the frozen bags into a bowl to defrost since I have found that every freezer bag springs leaks and when defrosting it I lost the entire thing down the drain when it leaked out of the bag! LOL Like Devonviolet I placed the bags flat on a cookie sheet. Once frozen they can be stacked in an upright freezer or a chest freezer.

When we couldn't fit all the milk in the freezer (milking over 12 high yield does daily) I started canning it instead. You can also can your milk in quart jars if you have a canning pressure cooker. I have my grandmother's Victory Garden canning booklet from WWII and it gave me the directions. You don't have to pre-pasteurize when you can and it will keep for years in a cool dark place like a cellar. Depending on your climate, you might be able to keep it in the garage. When we moved here I lost my cellar and we just kept it in a concrete block shed and it was ok. You can use it for feeding kids, calves, lamb, pigs and chickens. If you are planting a garden, a pressure canner is a good investment since you can preserve veggies, pickles, soups, tomato sauce, ketchup, and jams, etc. I fed 6 people and my daycare business from my garden for years. Check ads for used canning jars at farm sales, country rummage sales, etc. also put in a wanted ad for canning jars. Once older people know you are interested in them they will be happy to gift you with their old jars. You don't can as much when you are not feeding a large family. Most of us older people just use the pint jars for pickles and half pint for jam. You will want quarts for your family. I finally took several hundred of my quart jars to the glass recycler here.

I don't know if it would make good cheese or yogurt but you probably want to use your fresh milk for that. I froze milk, then later canned it to feed day old bull calves I bought from my friend whi had a dairy. She would give the calf a feeding of colostrum and I would pick them up from her. We fed 3 and 4 at a time, 1 gal am and 1 gal pm plus the old hay the goats picked over and didn't want. Cows are not picky like goats. When the calves hit 2 months old we loaded them up and took them to the cattle auction where they went through as a single lot. We got Angus calf prices for our Holstein calves because they were so healthy and shiny, no scours. It helped with the hay costs for the dairy goats.

If you want the milk canning directions I will look for the booklet. I think I packed it in my pressure canner box in the shed. Let me know.
 
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