I've checked the archives and have seen some information about once a day milking with penning the calf up at night. We have a Jersey heifer who just had her first calf and I am just curious about all the different options and what the trade-offs are--less milk, lower peak production etc. For example, can you keep a calf with a cow all the time and then just milk once a day? Can you do this and milk occasionally-or say every other day?You might have guessed that the milk is just for my husband and me and I am often away so I am just interested in anybody's experience and thoughts on this. Thanks! jane

-- Jane Shaw (janebug@hotmail.com), January 31, 2002

Answers

Response to Alternative Milking Schedules

It depends on how much milk your cow gives, as to whether or not you want to allow your calf to run with the cow all the time. My jersey gives 6 or 7 gallons a day at the top of her lactation. Of course, if a calf can take some of that, I am very happy. I allowed the calf to run with her till 3 months, when I sold it off, and replaced it with another baby calf from the local stock auction. A calf that is allowed to run with a cow will nurse far more out of her than one that is penned up and fed on schedule. And it will be far healthier, as any germs the calf is fighting will innoculate the udder, which has a separate immune system from the cow itself. The udder naturally will produce antibodies specificly designed to fight the germs the calf is fighting. So calves that run with the cow rarely have any health problems. Once the calf is taking most of the milk is a good time to go on vacation, as you wont have to find a relief milker. However, keep in mind that if at any time you slack off on milking her out, she will produce less and less milk, to fit the demand. My husband says that when he was growing up, his dad would buy a few extra calves to put on the cow a few days before going on a trip. It usually takes a few days for a cow to accept a strange calf. (Some cant be won over at all.)If your cow ends up giving far more milk than you want, this is a money-making opportunity for you. Just buy a few newborn calves at the sale to put with your cow, and resell them in 8 weeks. You could clear $100 profit per calf, depending on prices, of course.

-- daffodyllady (daffodyllady@yahoo.com), January 31, 2002.

Response to Alternative Milking Schedules

I forgot to mention the benefits for the cow, of having a calf nursing her. Lone cows get really lonely (can become depressed), as they are naturally herd animals. The calf's company will be a great comfort to her.

Furthermore, the constant nursing action is really good for her udder. Our jersey had a quarter that was almost blind, and somehow the calf adopted that quarter as it's favorite. I guess it was higher, and easier to get hold of. Anyhow, that quarter was stimulated to produce more and more, because of the action it got. It now produces more than the other front quarter.

And yes, if the calf is running with her, you can milk once a day and get by with it, but only if you get 2 gallons or less in that one milking.

I have found that I can construct any milking schedule I want, as long as it is every 12 hours. Sometimes, I milk an hour earlier every day, to progress to another schedule, if I want to change the schedule. Going the other direction (an hour later every day) will get translated into less milk flow, and an irritated cow. Cows like schedules.

Happy milking!

-- daffodyllady (daffodyllady@yahoo.com), January 31, 2002.

Response to Alternative Milking Schedules

That's the way my father used when we were young: one or at times two house cows (two when one was being or about to be dried off). I'd bring the cows in in the evening, feed the cows and pen and feed the calves separately, then let the cows out. In the morning Dad would milk. Mum could do it, would if Dad was sick, was actually a better milker than Dad as she'd grown up on a dairy farm, but she'd had ENOUGH, and there were other start-of-day things that needed doing while Dad was doing the milking. If we were away for a day or two - weeks - then the calves didn't get locked up - they stayed on the cows - simple and easy.

It didn't maximise production of milk, and the cows would certainly dry up earlier (more naturally) than if they were being milked for maximum production. However, we had a dual-purpose herd - mostly a mixture of Australian Illawarra Shorthorn and Milking Shorthorn. If one cow was drying up then there was generally another one that had been milked before with a calf at foot in the general herd; and if not then it was time to start another one, and you'd generally be able to at least pick one who had been a milking-cow's calf, so was used to people and the procedure even if not milking.

We had no shortage of milk. Dad used a three-gallon milking bucket (that's three BIG Imperial gallons - not the little stunted US gallons). He'd always at least half fill it - if he didn't then it was time to start another cow, and he'd been waiting for a suitable one to calve. However, he was generally careful not to fully milk-out either the first or second cow, as he wanted to leave a little for the calves. Even so, it was often normal to have the three-gallon bucket full.

Plenty of milk for drinking, plenty for separating and making butter of the cream; cream left over for clotted-cream on fresh or preserved fruit, and later for home-made ice-cream. If home-made cheese or yoghurt had been the thing then, there would have been plenty for that as well; but the climate would have been too hot and the refrigeration too scarce at that time. Anyway, milk for cereal, always milk for drinking, milk for cooking cakes and custards. I'd come home from school, take a couple of biscuits (you'd call them cookies) or some of Mum's fresh-cooked pikelets, get a chilled quart- jar of milk (yes - big Imperial quart, not little stunted US quart) out of the refrigerator, and drain it off - often not stopping. We'd drink milk where others today would drink reduced-fibre sugar-drinks - sorry - fruit juice (we ate our fruit - kept the juice in the natural packaging until we wanted it - I don't think we would have cared one way or another if we'd known that the fibre was better for us). No shortage of milk, and we grew strong and big-framed.

Oh, yes - Dad wouldn't keep pigs. His family had done it, and he just plain didn't like the smell. He figured there were other things he could do with his time and money that made as much profit and that he better liked doing. So any skim milk went to cats and dogs, or was allowed to sour (clabber) and fed to the poultry. Poultry loved us, and the ones that learnt better didn't get a chance to talk.

-- Don Armstrong (from Australia) (darmst@yahoo.com.au), January 31, 2002.