Can I get away with this?

[Ninny]

I would like to have milk goats but I have no desire to milk through the winter. Way to cold for me. So i was wondering if this would work.

Keep baby's with mamas for two weeks then milk her in the morning only till their weaned. After that milk twice a day till say fall. Then after they are bred let them slowly dry up till two weeks after the babies are born and start again.

I would stock up on soap and cheese for the winter. If milk will freeze for a couple months id do that to. Id have to decide what to do with the babies still. Sell them or maybe raise them for meat.

So do you think i could be a lazy dairy farmer? Im still in the thinking stages.

 

[freemotion]

Sure, why not? Go for it! Plan breedings around it, too.

 

[big brown horse]

Good to know too, because milking ALL THE TIME sounded really daunting to me.

 

[FarmerChick]

absolutely

that is what I do all the time.

when they kid, the kids get about 2 weeks of the doe, then I milk her and never take too much (put into my goat milk soap) and after they are weaned I take tons of it and freeze it for later use.....dry them up and wait for another kidding.

 

[freemotion]

If you don't need as much milk, you can also continue with just once a day milking after the kids are weaned. You will get a bit less milk, but probably still more than you can easily use up without making cheese and such. Unless you have a big family. Then make someone else milk through the winter! My brother milked our cow and then the goats before and after school, starting at age 11 or 12. In winters that got to -40 quite regularly, especially at 5 AM. So be a good parent and build character in those kidlets!!

 

[FarmerChick]

-40

good gravy that is insanity!

-40

who can handle that.....if, and only if we ever hit -5 for one day in all of winter I die...absolutely die, then it gets back into the 40s...LOL

-40 Honestly I can't ever imagine!!!

 

[BDial]

Sorry but where do you live??? lol

 

[freemotion]

When I was managing a horse farm up North, I had to bring some horses in from the way-back-pasture that were living in a shed until winter got bad. It wasn't too bad, then suddenly, WHAM! The temp with wind chill was -70!!!!! Totally dangerous weather. I wrapped my face and head with just about every thick polar fleece leg wrap we had in the tack room, along with my heavy coat, mittens, handwarmers, my -70 Sorel boots, my ski pants, etc. I had to walk. You go slow in that weather or risk hurting your nasal passages and lungs. I just opened the gate and let the horses go....they were ready for the heated barn!!! We had to cross some railroad tracks, and they headed down the tracks a bit.....I yelled, they came back...thank goodness, because there was no way I could go after them!

I will NEVER forget that cold! I carried lots of gear in my trunk in the winter. Going off the road or having a flat tire could mean frostbite or death. I knew someone who slid off a rural road at night and the wind covered the tracks quickly. They found his frozen body the next day. Yikes.

 

[big brown horse]

The north pole!


ETA: I am not laughing about the poor fellow that froze to death, we posted at the same time.

 

[FarmerChick]

I am NC

I lived up north but in the east (NJ) while we got cold and snow and PA had some wind chill...it was nothing like -40

OR

-70

OH MY G! Kill me at -70

yes I know what you mean with the sharp pain in the lungs in super cold weather......oh wow, freezing to death just trying to live in a life. WOW