Avoiding Kicked Milk Buckets

 Flies this time of year cause havick with milking.  Kicking at flies is a norm and no matter how much you use flie sprays you can't eliminate them all. That means buckets go flying, excuse the pun. 

My solution, can't believe it took this long to come up with it, is a modification of how I usually milk. This morning I didn't save milk but fed it to Chicory and the cats since I was going to spend hours working getting ready to use the tractor us clean pens.

I'm not fond of miling from the back stradling the milk stand and so I do this modification. The goats like it too. I set the bucket to the backside of the goat since goats kick forward. That puts the bucket out of the way. I reach forward in the normal method with my right hand to latch on to the goat's left teat.

 With  my left hand, I reach around the outside and to the back of the goat to latch on to her right teat. In this way the goat is being milked pretty normally except her teats are being tipped backwards instead of forward.

This method works great on goats that squat badly too. Also with yearlings as they have a tendency to kick. Of course that can be prevented by working early as a doeling and before the goat kids.

One thing I can't share with you is Penney. She comes in each time I milk and has a very long conversation with me. One sided of course. Her doing all the talking.

With Penney is this yearling male cat that sits in the interest and just watches.

Trying to get this thing to publish on another day isn't working so know that I have two posts out, one for today and one for tomorrow.