Handling The New Milker

You got her on the milk stand, HURRAY! She's eating her grain, great! You reach for her teats to milk and she squats down. Her udder tucked inside the milk bucket. Surely she can't hold this position for long? She can't so she uses the bucket as a prop and there she remains eating her grain. You stare, wondering how in the world you are going to fit your hands inside and milk her. Actually you won't but then you might have figured that out by now. Been there? Me too, more times than I can count. In my experience of 32 years of milking goats, a few horses, pigs, sheep, and yes - cows, I've learned a few lessons and have some tricks up my sleeve. 

I'll share some of those with you in regards to milking goats. The other species have tricks unique to them but that won't be discussed today. The first tip is to breed your doeling at around 60 or 70 pounds. You want them to kid when after they turn 1. You might think dairy goat yearlings milking for the first time is way too young. Actually for you and for them it is better. It will require a good feed program yes. But having kids at one does not stunt their growth when fed properly. Speak to any National Dairy Show herd owner and they all breed to kid after they turn one - not two. A linear appraisal judge, I believe it was Whiteside (He was awesome and very matter of fact.) ended a debate I had with a couple friends of mine on the subject. The increase in hormones helps physically and mammary wise in their development. The guy should know, he was raised on a goat dairy and has had goats for probably his whole life. Keep in mind I am speaking of dairy goats. I can not speak for the smaller breeds or meat breeds. 

I prefer the smaller size as they are easier to handle. If need be, you can physically lift them on the milking stand. Don't think because they have been on the stand since they were a month old that they will automatically jump up. Their udder fills and all of a sudden it is, 'Oh my, can I really jump up on that stand. It looks so high?' You think I'm being dramatic - oh just wait, you haven't seen drama until you've met a yearling Nubian who's milking for the first time. Be sympathetic, they are like a hormonal teenager, their body has changed and that makes everything so much more emotional and difficult. You WILL have to be patient and yes, you may have to at least lift that now so..... heavy back end up for them. Usually you can get them to put their front feet up and then of course they will want to work there front legs over to where they can eat the grain but not resort to putting the back end up too. Simply stand where they can't reach the grain unless they jump up. It usually works best if you position yourself so they have to mount from the back end of the milking stand. Don't pressure any more than absolutely necessary. It just impedes progress.


You've physically lifted them on the stand, yes!! They are eating their favorite grain, good. Now how do you get around the newby squat. Simple - you don't use a bucket. Instead get a baby bottle or anything similar that you can grip nicely. You grab hold of the baby bottle in one hand and the teat in the other. Then squirt the milk into the bottle. Yes, that means a larger mouth on the bottle is needed. It takes longer but then you can milk almost the whole herd before you get that first time milker done so plan on it. Think ahead of something the girl can eat that isn't all grain like pelleted hay. It could take a while and you don't want to cause tummy scours from an over load of COB. Word of caution milk makes the bottle slippery and you will get some milk on the outside so frequently empty the milk into your milk bucket which is preferably not on the milk stand that she is tap dancing on. With the baby bottle you can still milk to a degree while the tap dance is going on, very important because you have to teach her that the show must go on. Now if it a high stepping  Riverdance leap kind of stepping then a bit of preparatory work is in order first.

Put the milking supplies to the side and simply put your hand on her udder -- firmly. No tickling! Sometimes I run my hand down the hip because they are use to that and then stop on the udder. When she begins to become more comfortable with that, then move your hand a short distance (remember firmly) and then stop with your hand still on her udder. Do NOT take your hand off. If she holds relatively still for a  millisecond then remove your hand. Begin again and when that area is good, move your hand further and further until you are feeling the whole udder. If she can remove your hand by kicking and thrashing then she will do it because it works. Teach her that what works is to hold relatively still and your hand will leave. Slowly keep your hand on her udder longer and longer as she tolerates the touch better. 

Pudge is hardly a Newby but she liked my to lean into her slightly. One could hardly help but not to she was always so pudgy. 

 
Some newbies like you to lean gently into them as it gives them reassurance. 

For safety sake, so the newby does not fall off the other side while their neck is locked into the stanchion, we have a side on our stand. I lean on the doe gently and she leans into the side. This often calms them down. Goats cluster in the corner pressed up against each other and the wall or fence when frightened. I just take a page out of their own play book and use it. When they are relatively calm with this, then move to the next step.

Don't milk, just hold your hand (just one) in the position of milking with your fingers around one teat. Less stimulus for the newby. Then I release my hand when the behavior is positive or in other words they hold still even a short, short time. See a pattern? When the goat begins to tap dance less and hold still more, then I hold my hand a little longer and a little longer as the behavior grows more positive. Speak sweetly to her. Not, "You little piece of ......!" Unless you can say it in the kindest of ways. This is all suppose to be positive. 

You want the milk stand to represent good things like grain, a more comfortable udder, and gentle hands. This reward system does take skill to develop but it works incredibly well. When one hand is excepted reasonably well then move on to using two hands. Be aware that it might be a one hand at a time milking method for a few weeks. My well prepared yearlings are almost all milked one hand at a time for the first week and sometimes two.

Now let's say you can milk her but she still has the occasional kick. Most newbies do for a while. Just put the bucket in back of her legs and squirt to the south end because 99 percent of goats will kick forward with the leg or legs. Occasionally I've had one try and kick with both legs. Yeah, it ends up with an upset heap on the milking stand. Normally they don't do that twice. The whole getting comfortable having you handle intimate parts of their anatomy takes time, weeks of time if preparatory work was not done. If the newby was worked with far in advance of kidding then all this newby behavior is usually over in a week or a little longer with intermittent forgetfulness.

I start training my doelings at this age. Handle the doeling everywhere. Pick up her feet and especially rub in the area of her udder. You aren't milking at this stage just preparing to so don't tug on the teats. 

I sold a yearling this spring with her two male offspring and the buyer is thrilled. He says his grandson is milking her while she stands un-tethered in the middle of the pen. He just thinks she is the most laid back goat he has ever seen. My husband failed to tell him that I trained her to do that. I train ALL my yearlings to do so. If the preparatory work is done, it is quite simple to do. I get the newly kidded doeling up against the fence and press against her. Keep her from moving forward by putting a knee in her way if need be, then shift backwards a bit toward the udder. On rare does I have to tie them to the fence to stop the forward motion. Then I press and milk one baby bottle at a time, milking one side and then the other going back and forth to encourage the let down.  A nice udder massage works wonders to help her let down. I use it on the milk stand also when needed for the young and older does. 

 I searched and searched for pictures of newbies being milked and realized I didn't have any pictures 
and now even this last little doe who kidded this year is gone. I have only a buck and one doe left, both Saanens and the beginning of a new herd.
 
I fill bottles with colostrum and make sure the newborn kids get plenty within the first hour of birth. I don't worry about their nursing until they get on their feet strong. Just takes a few hours. Then either work I teach the kids to suckle or simply leave the kids with the mother and milk her in this un-tethered position multiple times a day. For me it is much easier than keeping milk in the refrigerator and heating it up four times a day.  When newborn I also milk and feed in the middle of the night for 2 to 3 nights initially. Frequent demand stimulates the mother's milk production increasing her supply.

From the time the kids are small, I have them getting on the milking stand with a reward of a small treat. It does not have to be every day but at least a couple times a week. The last few weeks of a yearling does pregnancy, I do not ask her to get on the milking stand. It is hard with the weight of twins or triplets. Yes, most of mine have twins and even the occasional set of triplets.  I do not ask the doe to get on the milking stand for the first three or four days after kidding. They are sore. I milk squatting or kneeling on the ground.  Even though they have been on the stand for a year and their udder handled frequently in the pen and on the stand, they will do some dancing. It is uncomfortable. You nursing and past nursing moms know what I'm talking about. 

Even with all this preparing of the doeling, they will might do the newby squat and dance. This will last for a short while and in comparison very mild to what you would have dealt with had you not prepared her.The last yearling I worked with this year held one leg up the whole time when milked. At least she couldn't dance in that position. It worked for her. It worked for me.By next year I'm sure both feet will be on the ground. I think anyway since I sold her.

Possible Milk Fever

 Isn't Bella cute? But what I want you to take note of is her momma, Chicory, and how upright her feet are. This photo was taken Monday.

 This is a photo on Tuesday. Chicory is guarding her little ones sleeping and her hips are still tipped sharply from delivery and maybe because she doesn't feel real well. Her legs are sharply posty in back. A little concern on our part but she did just give birth so it was a keep watch mode at this stage.

Compare that picture with this foot. This is this morning. Note how far under the hoof is thrust. Chicory can barely get around her feet hurt so bad. This hoof is the worse but the others aren't great either.

 It started yesterday and last night we gave her 5 cc's of a broad spectrum antibiotic along with Calcium Drench just in case she is having a Milk Fever episode. Milk Fever really doesn't have to do with milk at all or in the case of my does, a fever either. I've had two does I suspected of Milk Fever in my 29 years of having goats. The first two years not counting because the goats were wethers.

Both does happen to be heavy milkers but that doesn't have to be the case with Milk Fever. The problem isn't always that the doe doesn't have enough calcium but for some reason or other, her body isn't using her stores. In my case, I feed calcium in their diet. 

As for Chicory, she did this little episode when she kidded the first time, with her previous owner. Who happens to be a very conscientious, record keeping, goat owner. She records every hoof trim, milking amounts, everything. It was this foot problem that made her available to us.

For the past three kiddings, I've owned her. She's had a mild problem of going down a bit on her pasterns. Yet, last year her feet were stronger than the year before. She did have a weird week last week before kidding. Her udder was huge and rock hard, plus she never had strong contraction though when I went inside her, the first kids feet were right inside ready. 

Does Chicory have Milk Fever, don't know, but we'll cover the bases of bacterial infection from birth and Milk fever. 
Wish Chicory could talk, beyond her insesant moaning that is. We'd get a better picture of what's wrong. But beyond her leaning her head on me for sympathy and the moans, she's not talking. 

She is up on her feet a bit more today. Compared to last night when she didn't even move off the ground where she was laying when I poked her twice to inject the 5 cc's in two sites to lesson the soreness, that's a good sign. 

She fought me more on this morning's dose of calcium. I drench her using a turkey baster. Its's cheap and if you squeeze slowly, the goat won't drown.

This calcium drench works okay too. It's for cows but I have both on hand from a few years ago when I had a Saanen do the same thing. She didn't come out quite so well. I didn't know what was going on and the delay meant she ended up with heart problems. She went on to continue having kids but always had to be watched carefully and treated with extra calcium when she kidded. I called a gal who previously ran a 1200 cow dairy with her day and she continues to raise a few Holstein cows for show. I learned a bunch.

You may not have had to deal with milk fever. I hope not.  But it is wise to have supplies on hand, just in case. A goat can go down and die within a very short period, before the store or vets open in the morning. Here, we don't take our goats to the vets if possible because they are not real knowledgeable about them. Cattle, horses, sheep, dogs, and cats being the main business and I understand that. One can't be up to date on every species health issues. That would be a huge task. 

This site has a brief over view of the problem. http://fiascofarm.com/goats/milkfever.htm

Oh yeah, since it doesn't rain but pours, I'm treating an eye infection on Daisy, one of the kids, and our daughter went into labor yesterday, two months too early.

The hospital was able to stop her labor but it's stay down time since she's having other complications also.

The good news is Murphy appears to have grown bored attacking our computers. LOL

Canning Ghee

Ghee sitting on the kitchen counter cooling. It will turn white completely white when I take it to the basement storage room.

After learning how wonderful ghee is, I had to look up to see if you could can it. Sure enough, ghee can be canned. With all I've learned lately, I now know ghee is going to become a basic part of my cooking. I've used extra virgin olive oil for years thinking I was doing a good thing since it was simply pressed and no chemicals used to extract the oil. What I didn't take the time to learn was the smoke point. OOOSP!! the experts recommend that you use extra virgin for salad dressings and light sauces -- not for deep fat frying or baking at temperatures 350 or greater. Well, dummy here was using it for everything despite its cost all while thinking I was saving our health. Not!! Not even those wonderful home-made buttermilk pancakes were as healthy as I thought since they were fried at 350F. So now I'm rethinking my oil use since I'm not willing to buy light olive oils even though their smoke point goes up to 468F and canola oil is highly processed too so its out though I had been using it in baked goods mainly because of the price of olive oil. The manufacturers just can't remove all the chemicals they use to extract the oil from the plants and I've wanted to find a way clear of using the canola oil and light olive oil and now I've a nutritious solution --ghee.

Ghee depending on the purity smoke point goes from 375 to 485F falling well within my cooking range. Besides it is one more thing I can do myself and not be depend on others to provide for me.

But, goat butter isn't available all of the year when you are producing your own. For two or three months goats are dry before kidding. Then after kidding, the young are bottle fed for two months, making it four or five months of no milk, -- no milk, no butter. That's a third of the year. My plan is to eventually get two goats going where the gap of when we are without milk is either zero or only one month. One month in which I've enough frozen milk, butter, and cream, in the freezer to tide us over. That would mean kidding early in the spring - April and then July in the summer.

We presently have one three year old doe freshening in April and two coming yearlings which will freshen for the first time in May. One of the yearlings I will sell not needing quite that much milk and by next year I hope to have the two remaining does on schedule.

Enough of my plans, what you are wanting is the directions to how to can your own ghee so you can include it in your own cooking goals of self-sufficiency.

I took most of the butter I'd frozen in the freezer and put it in my milk pot. The one I heat milk in prior to separating.

I melted it on about 3 on my electric stove, a higher temperature than the 1 I set the stove on with just one pound of butter. As it began to boil, I turned it down. Lots of foam will form on top as the butter separates into water, oil, and milk solids but don't worry just keep cooking away.

The foam calms down as the water boils off.When done, the milk solids are browned on the bottom leaving an oil that can be used by lactose intolerant people. In an emergency, this oil can be also used in a lamp for fuel - handy stuff. Now none of these instructions are anything new since I've already told you about making butter so refer back to that post for detailed instructions. You go on from here to straining the oil like before but you place it in sterilized jars. I used half pints to minimize the chance of moisture causing the ghee to go bad before the jar is all used up. With moisture in mind, I used a hair dryer turned on high blowing the air inside the jars to make sure they were completely dry since water invites bacterial growth.

Now canning ghee is nothing new to you who can a lot but where typical canning differs with ghee is that I boiled my lids but then dried them with clean paper towels and used the hair dryer once more make sure the moisture was evaporated off. After placing the lids on top of the jars, I put the jars in to a boiling water bath canner, allowing two inches of boiling water to cover the jars. I processed them for 10 minutes and voila, that was it. Easy peasy as Cindy says.

I should have plenty to get me by until I'm making butter again.

One of these days, I'm going to get a chart made to help with the uses for goat milk. You know, whole milk makes buttermilk, light cream - sour cream, heavy cream -butter, whole milk - cheese, but there's one you make with whey ( I've done it but I can't remember which type of milk product I use.) etc. etc.

Plus, the recipes for the ones I make often I need in a handy booklet so that I'm getting the full use of my milk because this brain just can't store all the information I need. The files just keep getting lost up there.

Another goal this year is to make cream cheese, something I just never got to this year. And I can't remember what I made ricotta cheese with, was it whole milk, no--- I think it was skimmed milk. See, I've just got to get better organized to better use my resources. Prices of food are going to climb and I know Kirk's income won't keep pace. It already isn't. That's where I've got to shrink our dependence on store products making us less vulnerable to the changes.

Winter Canning

It's the perfect time of year to do some more canning. The weather is cold outside and the canner kicks off lots of heat warming the kitchen making it feel snug and comfortable. Not like in the summer when the sweat, oh excuse me, dew drops form on your forehead from the stifling kitchen making you feel miserable. Don't forget the smell. It permeates throughout the house adding to the inviting warmth an ambiance of homeyness.

Yes, canning in the winter is so... much more pleasant. But your probably wondering what I'm canning since the garden is a graveyard of once green lush vegetation.

Jam of course since we don't produce enough raspberries, ( a soil problem I'm going to work on big time this summer - I hope) and blackberries which we don't produce at all. I find them at a discount price frozen and let them sit in the freezer until the weather turns cold. Then of course I can milk because in a few days Chicory will be dry since she will freshen the beginning of April. That's the jars on the left. On the right is ghee. I know, I've yet to give you the instructions. I promise I will.

Of course beans. These are navy beans. Why would I can beans? They are cheaper to buy dried especially since I go to the beanery over the mountain where my mom lives and get them for a song. It's the place the farmers take their bean harvests and get beans for seed for the next year. They clean them and bag as many as I want of several kinds.

The other reason is the long list of ingredients in this can of kidney beans from the store.
Mine, just water and beans.

This year I canned 10 bean, navy bean, black beans, and kidney beans. I have pink and red beans but I won't get them done for other projects are knocking at my door or rather pounding loudly.

Why not can beans? It so simple. Bring to a boil the dried beans covered by a couple inches of water. Boil 30 minutes, stirring frequently. Pack hot beans into jars, leaving an inch headspace, (I suggest leaving more than that as I have a tendency to over fill my jars), and ladle hot cooking liquid or boiling water over the beans. Remove air bubbles, put on lids and caps, process at 10 pounds pressure in a pressure canner. I of course process at 12 pounds pressure because of our altitude. Process pints for 1 hour and 15 minutes and quarts for 1 hour and 30 minutes.

It heats up the kitchen nicely, avoids all the additives, and your not eating the can. Yes, the foods inside of a can eat away at the metal giving you more than you wanted or should be ingesting for your health. Acidic foods are especially bad about this. And as far as using lots of energy, well, get a better canner. Mine, once it gets up to pressure has to be turned way way down to barely on. It will maintain the temperature with very little electricity. My old one wouldn't.

Usually this time of year I'm also finishing off the squash and pumpkins, canning and freezing them but since I didn't get around to growing any ---- I still had quite a bit left over from last year so I'm still good and they will go in this year. If I had a cellar, oh how I'd love one, then I'd probably be doing sauerkraut and possibly beets or something. I don't really know since I've never had one.

Next, I'm going to start fruit leather. Using the older bottles of peaches. Sometimes that includes applesauce or pears but not this year. This winter delight gets eaten up in a hurry and our kids look forward to it every year. You can also use those older cans of pineapple etc. I'll talk about this more later.

So rev up your canner and get going. It's winter canning season and for those of you who like canned chili, can your own, your doing the beans anyway and don't stop there. You could do ham and beans too. I've done all kinds of things including soups. And who knows, this year might just be the year I finally make orange marmalade.

Making Ghee

So busy and so much to talk about that I've five posts I'm working on and I'm having trouble finding the time to write. It's one thing to do it, another to photograph and prepare the photographs for the blog, and yet another thing to write the posts. You see the kids are STILL sick but well enough to take to school. Noses running and a little cough make it so the kids are more active but still demanding and a bit grouchy. Lots of holding time still for the youngest and

This all while I'm full swing in to my winter canning season. What? canning in the winter. Yup, I have a winter canning season when I've emptied enough jars in the fall that I can begin canning once more but that's a story for another day.

Except, that I canned ghee also along with the usual things. Yes, you can can ghee, but first I'll have to tell you about how to make it. I've done it twice now. The first time was a small batch and the second a large one in order to can it and help clear space for the beef going insidethe freezer in part where I had frozen butter. Today, I'm using ghee in some bread while sneaking in some wheat flour, and squash in an unusual way. I'll tell you about that too. If it works out well it will be a long post and if not a bleep in another. All this is part of my eat healthier campaign that is to include the kids. That is where the difficult part comes in. I've got to sneak nutrition in since their use to store packaged items. I've been slowly working on them all fall and now it's time to step it up a big notch. Ghee is a part of that program since it is so assimilable for the body. Besides, it will save money on all the olive oil I use to buy since ghee will take some of its place in my cooking.

If your wondering what the picture is, of course it's ghee turns white, which is what it does when cool. This is my ghee in the refrigerator though the instructions say it will keep at room temperature for a month. I'm overly cautious since this is all new to me.

A drop of moisture can cause your ghee to go bad since it allows bacteria to enter so just in case in the refrigerator it's going. I just have a pint so it can keep company with the buttermilk, and the sour dough starter.

Now for those instructions you've been waiting for.

The first step to making ghee is to purchase some butter or in my case make butter from my dairy goats. They say a pound makes about a pint. I didn't measure so I don't know, sorry. Measuring is something that doesn't come natural to me.

Some say use salted and some say use unsalted. Then some go on to say that cultured butter is the only kind to use for it gives a much better flavor. I wouldn't know since I've never had cultured butter. Since everyone seems to have a different opinion, I say use what you've got and then go on to form your own opinion on the subject by experimenting. Let me know will you so I'll know too.

My ghee is from goat butter of course since I'm trying to learn to do as much as possible with goat milk. I had some already in the refrigerator so I plopped it in a heavy saucepan over low heat. Burning off moisture is part of the process so DON'T cover the pot. Besides all the noise this makes will have you in constant suspense if you can't watch the whole process.
As the moisture burns off the butter will foam up. It will begin to resemble the mud pots in Jelly Stone Park. Oh come on, haven't you heard of Yogie Bear? Well, he really was from just up north of us in Yellowstone Park where the world famous mud pots reside. When ever I do something like this I can't help but think of my old stomping grounds and though I've never met a bear as friendly as Yogie, I have often watched the heat build up from the volcano underneath the park watching Old Faithful blow high in to the air or stood on the walkways as the air bubbles rose to the surface of the mud pots. Listening as they make a light popping sound as the bubbles break the surface.

We taught the kids about this phenomenon before we took them to Yellowstone by heating applesauce on the stove. Back to making ghee. Watch for the following signs that your ghee is done. Remember, butter boils at a very low temperature so keep the stove turned WAY down.

• Changes from a cloudy yellow to a clean golden yellow.


• Develops a popcorn smell.


• Stops foaming and makes crackling sounds. Reminds me of rendering fat for soap.

A thin light tan crust forms on the nearly motionless surface.

• The milk solids at the bottom turn from white to brown. This can take 30 or 40 minutes or longer if you like me do a second batch and it is quite large.
  
• Strain it through cheese cloth or I used my milk straining pads and my milk strainer.

If your ghee is this dark, you've cooked it too long. I told you I was a good teacher because I make so many mistakes I know what not to do. Don't fret though because this ghee is still good, just a little overly cooked.

Make sure the jar you put the ghee into is completely dry or the moisture inside will allow bacteria to enter. I used a hair dryer blowing the hot air inside the jar to make sure it was completely dry. When the ghee has cooled, store in a dry place away from direct sunlight. Be careful the spoon you use to dip into the ghee when scooping some out for use. It also must be completely dry.

You can also do this in the oven on 300F but I choice the stove top method.

Ghee has no dairy anymore since the milk solids were left in the bottom of the pan and screened out with the cheese cloth so lactose intolerant people can use this product. Also just as a note of interest, clarified butter has 20% milk remaining.

Now comes the incorporating of ghee into your diet. I've used it to fry in and this morning I added it into bread. Later, I'll tell you about my experience making pie crust with it and using it in biscuits. You can substitute ghee for part of you lard or shortening but since this is a blog where I not only tell you but show you, I'll have to do it first. So many things to try and so little free time.

Stay tuned, I have another page done for my gardening booklet, _since I haven't heard from anyone on how beneficial it is to them, I'm wondering if I should continue the series [speak up] or I'll just do it for myself. No hard feelings, I just want to share what's beneficial to you and not cause you to fall a sleep on the other stuff. I'm finding the information very useful to my gardening plans but I'm not you. Remember, your comments help direct my posts. I'll also let you know what besides ghee I've been canning this cold winter month with snow piling outside. Of course, I'll have to give you instructions on how to can ghee also. So hurry out and buy some butter or make some if your goats are still fresh. I'll understand if you can't make goat butter right now. Chicory is about dry so I will begin to freeze some milk this week for those long months while I await her freshening. Okay, it's only going to be a couple months but it seems long when your beloved milk isn't fresh.

I've also made more buttons and knitted a lovely ascot from wool and alpaca. I have a new great way to make buttermilk. How will I ever get all these posts done? Just keep reminding me of what you want to hear and I keep plugging along.

Goat Ghee

No, it is not a miss spelling. I know I can't spell but seriously it is suppose to be G- H- E- E. Not gee as in gee and haw when you are commanding an oxen team to turn. And I'm assuming someone with phonetics spelled it ghee, using the h to keep the e from telling the g to say J like it is in gee. Then again my assumptions are usually wrong so who knows why the spelling. I must have guessed the pronunciation correctly though because my doctor didn't laugh at me when I said ghee as in McGee and he would have.
Goat Butter

Some of you are wondering what the heck I'm talking about and what's a picture of goat butter doing in this post. Ghee starts with butter and of course since this is a home-made blog, it's goat butter. Ghee is not clarified butter as many of the articles on the Internet would lead you to think. Though it is made in the same way, except you go beyond clarified butter and remove the moisture and butter solids. Oil is what's left.





Why I made ghee in the first place would be akin to - because I could or the mountain was there so I climbed it. No, the brain was not thoroughly engaged in this project until after ghee was created. I'd like to think my instincts were telling me I should do it but that would be a lie. The truth is, I just wanted to try it because it was one more thing you can do with goat milk. Someday, I want to write a book on the many wonderful and simple things a milk goat owner can do with their goat milk.



Then when I looked at the directions to making ghee and saw it smells like buttered popcorn when your done. I had to make it. Have I told you of my addiction to popcorn? Well, if there was a P.A. A. (popcorn addiction association meeting) I'd have to be there 7 times a week in hopes of working on a cure. But then with my luck they'd serve caramel popcorn, chocolate covered popcorn, cinnamon popcorn, buttered popcorn ... at the meetings. LOL
Where I come from, all meetings have refreshments.She's now writing all over herself. So far not the furniture or walls. What has this to do with ghee. Absolutely nothing, but my daughter said text needs broken up with pictures and I have to save my ghee ones for the next segment on the subject.

It wasn't until I hit the Internet and went beyond how to make it, to health benefits and uses that I realized I'd discovered a gold mine.

The first thing I found out was that ghee is a common oil used in Indian cooking and I'm not referring to the Sioux Indians just north of us or the Shoshone and Arapaho Indians west of us. Remember, I'm in Wyoming. You know the least populated state. The one in the boondocks where the Indians are still on the war path. Okay, maybe they aren't but I've have been questioned when visiting other states by their residents and foreigners. I'll admit, I would spin a outlandish tale of the things we had to do to stay safe when a marauding ban left one of the reservation but then when I'd scared them silly, I had to tell them the truth. No, the Indians are not on the warpath YET. LOL

What the articles were referring to was Indians from India. That food I've never tasted since Wyoming as far as I know does not have an Indian restaurant. No, here we serve Rocky Mountain Oysters and say Cowboy Up a great deal. Don't tell me you don't know what Rocky Mountain Oysters are? Well, look it up. I know you have the Internet. I'm not going to tell you or I might loose my G rating even though this is an agricultural based blog.

I had not heard of ghee but I have heard of clarified butter. Anyone that watches cooking shows has come acrossed it. My favorite past-time in motels since we don't have cable or satellite television. Clarified butter has a much higher smoke point than butter, making it popular with chefs. As you know after the smoke point is reached the oil becomes a carcinogen. Ghee has a higher smoke point than clarified butter.

• Butter 350F



• Clarified Butter 400F



• Ghee 485 F

The process of creating goat ghee started with goat cream. Oh, you can use cow butter if you want but what would the point of that be when I have dairy goats?

Yes, they are still eating Christmas candy canes. Sugar does wild things to these children so I dole it out with care.

When you are doing ghee from scratch and I mean completely from scratch, it lends you to wonder if the result is worth the work. I mean, I had to milk the goat - do the dishes, separate the milk to get cream - do the dishes, chill the cream and make butter - do the dishes, melt the cream and make ghee - do the dishes. Doing it once wasn't a big deal but whether or not to continue sent me off to the Internet once more.

• What I found on the Internet was that there are unsaturated fats and saturated fats.



• The saturated fats can further be divided in to long- chain and short-chain fatty acids.



• Long chain fatty acids [animal fats] can not be completely metabolised by the body leading to cancer and blood clots.



• Short-chain fatty acids are assimilated and metabolised so that they release energy. Ghee is a short-chain fatty acid and its rate of absorption is 96 percent, the highest of all oils and fats.



• Unsaturated fats are further broke down into two kinds: monounsaturated and polyunsaturated. Monounsaturated fats, such as olive oil, are healthy. Polyunsaturated fats are not healthy. The latter becomes oxidized and creates free radicals, which damage the cells of the body.

Ghee is a short-chain saturated fat, (check the points above) and further more mostly a monounsaturated fat - 27 percent with 4 to 5 percent polyunsaturated fat.

Ghee is one of the good guys. This does not mean you can eat all you want. As with all good things, a little is good but a lot isn't.

When I saw some reports saying ghee causes heart problems, I questioned my naturopath on the subject. I'm always leery at who is paying for these studies and how conclusive are they? Naturopaths like ghee very much. it has Vitamin E and lots of other nutrients and beats is far less processed than canola oil and the like. When I said I was making my own from goat butter, not cow. That got an even greater hoorah! Goat's milk is alkaline, not acidic like cows and the digestibility is greater than cow's milk.

But wait!!! I haven't told you how to make ghee yet. Too bad. You'll have to wait. My daughter has told me not to make my post too long and this one already is, so stay tuned.

Oh, and by the way. I lied. The crop notes aren't 3/4 done. I found a whole lot more I wanted to add. The bean page is done though. So next I'll share that bit of information and the I'll tell you how to make Ghee. Oh did I say you can do pie crusts with it too and it doesn't splatter when you cook with it or that it ..... The ghee posts might just take a while to complete. Stay tuned.

Making Yogurt

Thank you all for your kind words and thoughts. My mom is doing quite well, miraculously in fact. The doctor said they are amazed that an 80 year old woman with severe osteoporosis could have fallen down 15 cement stairs and come out looking so well, very black and blue, scraped, and three fractures in bones connected to the hip. Not a fractured hip as they first thought. That meant she didn't have to have surgery but one of the fractures is on the left side of the sacrum which is an extremely painful break. Pain management and time are the cure along with some blood transfusions for the minor internal bleeding. She will be in the hospital for a few days and then move to a long term care facility until she can get around a little on her own.

Now I really must tell you about my yogurt making experience.

Years ago when our kids were young, I use to make yogurt but not with great success. Every time I mixed up a batch it came out sloshy, not firm. I pretended it was Keefer, a drinkable yogurt like product, but after a while I just quit making it. I used an electric yogurt maker and shifted to making it on the tove top by placing jars in a dutch oven partially filled with water and preheated that was heated to 115 F. But, the stove top method rusted my lovely dutch oven and neither the electric model nor the stove top method was making a firm yogurt. I gave up. Yes, yogurt makers I did try adding powdered milk and about gagged at the taste.

My wounds of failure now healed, I decided with my resolution to use my goat milk to the fullest, I had to make yogurt. Once again I bought an electric yogurt maker. I just don't have time, with three little ones, to fuss with the stove top method working on getting the temperature just right and holding it there. If I have to buy a non cast iron dutch oven I might as well buy a yogurt maker and besides I figured I'd save money since we do eat lots of yogurt.

My first try was a HUGE success. Don't know if it was the fact that I did not use whole goat milk or what but this is firm yogurt. Yes, I'm holding a jar of it upside down and it doesn't show the slightest hint of falling out. That is FIRM yougurt.

Was it really the difference in the milk that made the yogurt firm? Don't know yet but I'll find out in the next day or two as I'm going to try making whole goat milk yogurt. What I did this time was separated milk through the milk separator once saving the lighter cream to make sour cream and then put the rest of the cream through once more to give me some heavy cream for butter making. While creating this, I allowed the lighter cream that went through the separated to divide off into heavy cream and the rest into the milk from the first separation. From this semi-whole milk, I made my yogurt. So yogurt makers tell me, is my guess correct and less cream allows the culture to form a more cohesive product?

You really need the yogurt to be firm since when you add your sweetener and fruit, the yogurt becomes a bit slushy.
After I fuss with trying different levels of cream in the yogurt and testing for firmness and flavor, I want to try making different kinds of yogurt flavors like lemon which I think I'll make a custard like concoction to add to the yogurt to get a lemony flavor since just adding lemon juice would make the yogurt runny. Anyone come up with a variety of flavors of yogurts like the selection at the store?

The above photo is blackberry yogurt and of course just adding fruit and a sweetener is a simple, delightful addition. I'm also going to move beyond just yogurt to using it for ice cream. We decided that drinking JUST whole milk and cream, ice cream was a bit fattening. Not that we won't be having some of the fattening variety too but cutting calories wouldn't hurt us either. Some completely whole milk we will drink since it is higher in vitamin A than its lower fat cousin.

What I'm really excited about in making my own yogurt is that I can skip some more additives. My Yoplait favorites have modified corn starch, nonfat milk which is powdered milk that my book said all store yogurts add (it helps to thicken the yogurt), high fructose corn syrup (which I'll leave to my candies which I know aren't good for me), and the Yoplait label says citric acid, tricalcium phosphate, pectin, and add vitamin A ( that's because it's made with skim milk which is low in Vitamin A), and they throw in, acetate, and Vitamin D3. Commercial milk is also lacking in vitamin D's. So there you have it home-made yogurt gives you less which really means your getting more. Following that? You don't get what you really shouldn't have while getting more of what you really need.

Those of you who haven't made yogurt yet from your goat milk, heat up some milk to near boiling, cool it rapidly by placing the pan in a bowl of cold water decreasing the temperature to 115 F. Then use a yogurt culture. I bought mine from a cheese making supply. You can make yogurt from plain yogurt from the store. Keep in mind you are getting the additives too but for a first try attempt go for it. The pamphlet with the yogurt maker said don't use your yogurt from this batch that you started with store yogurt more than once to try and reculture another yogurt batch. Why? They didn't elaborate on but if your using a powdered culuture from a cheese making supply you can keep going and going.

Now I've got to make some granola. Kirk says what's missing from our home-made yogurt is granola. I use to make lots of that when the kids were little and I guess I'd better scrounge up that old recipe and get to work. He's dreaming of layering home-made yogurt and granola during his morning break at work. I can't argue with that choice of nurtitional snack.

Just in case your wondering why you should be eating yogurt especially home-made I'll let you in on a little tid bit of knowledge I learned from The Yogurt Book which is 117 pages long. Way too long to cover in this post.

Yogurt is digested in an hour while milk takes two or three hours to digest.

The process of making yogurt breaks down the vitamins in the milk to a more assimilable state, meaning your body absorbs more of the nutrients.

Yogurt also kills lots of bad bugs in your stomach like Salmonella typhi, and dysentery.

Yogurt is also a great way to treat diarrhea and in children it can prevent them from developing it.

I'll let you know how the whole milk yogurt turns out. I've made the buttermilk 7 times keeping the culture from the first batch going. The sour cream didn't turn out so well keeping it going but I've some more culuture and I'll get it master yet. Cream cheese making still lurks in my future but I figure I'd best get what I've got going down first.

The Workings of a Milk Separator

I'm making ice cream this morning and so yesterday I whipped up a custard and put it in the refrigerator to chill. But before I could do that I had to separate milk so I'd have some cream. I got out my bowls, one is about a half inch shorter than the other one and a couple inches narrower. I thought I might show you how much cream I am getting since it is toward the end of our girl's lactation. You need to know the differences between the bowls so you can gauge.
The larger bowl is in the back and the smaller bowl is in the front. This view is after the first time the milk went through the separator. Note how the two bowls are filled to the same height though they aren't the same size.

Here is an aerial view.

This is after I put the light cream that was in the smaller bowl back through the separator so I'd have heavy cream.

When finished, I had a large bowl full of skimmed milk plus one quart of milk that isn't shown and one and a half quarts of heavy cream. The pigs, cats, and chickens will get the skimmed milk. We had intended to butcher pigs this weekend but the freezing temperatures in the day time and the forecast for single digits (Fahrenheit) at night put a halt to that project. If we hung the meat in the garage it would freeze solid. So instead I'm going to make two kinds of ice cream. Not that that makes a whole lot of sense considering how cold it is outside but our grocery store owner told me that she sells by far more ice cream in the winter than in the summer. See, I'm not completely strange, I have company.

While I was separating milk I thought some of you who aren't familiar with the machine might like a sneak preview into how it works. This is the separator without the big bowl on top. See the little hole in the center for the milk to run through? A float, which is a quarter inch hollow plastic disk sits on top of this to slow down the flow of milk from the bowl. It makes a big mess if it isn't in place. No, don't ask me how I know that? You can probably guess.

When that layer is taken off you have this section which the cream collects in to. Remember cream is lighter than milk and rises so the top section is the cream collection area. That's how I know to put the smaller bowl under this spout.

The milk flows down through the hole in the top of the metal piece you see sticking out of the cream collection piece.

This metal component is made of of ten separate discs that you see on the left. They sit on the structure with the hole in the top where the milk flows through. As the milk flows down through this hole it squirts outward through the four holes at its base and then into the discs. I should show you a separate picture but I haven't one and I'd take one but my post today is being a bear to work with. Moving pictures it will barely do and not always where I want them.

So please look at the piece next to the bowl in the upper left hand corner. See the hole part way down. That's where the milk flows out of. You will see holes in the sides of the discs for this milk to flow out from.

This metal piece when all put together sits on top of the cone you see in the middle of the milk collection plastic piece. The motor in the base of the machine causes this cone to whirl rapidly which causes the metal section to whirl. Centrifugal force causes the lighter cream to separate and rise into the higher collection reservoir while the milk sinks into the lower one.

Our old hand crank antique, worked when we had all the kids to help keep it cranking but they're gone. It had eighteen discs instead of the ten that is in this small electric table top model. What difference ten versus eighteen makes, I don't know. I'm not fond of the idea of all these plastic parts but it is the only model available last year when I bought this one.

Now if we only had the yak cow my husband wants then we'd have more cream than ever. There cream level being much higher than goats or dairy cows. Not sure what it taste like but since we have a couple herds in Wyoming, I'm going to find out someday.

To Milk Once or Twice A Day

You are keeping me busy answering all the questions that you have. I appreciate your vote of confidence that I can be of assistance. I'm still behind but I'm pedaling fast so readers please be patient and Barb, this post is specifically for you. The rest of you readers please chime in with your opinions and facts if you have them. As you know I'm quite opinionated and I can't always be right. lol So keep the comments coming. It's up to you to keep me in line.

Today's question is whether to milk once or twice a day. Actually, I do both. Part of the year I milk twice and part only once a day. Let me explain. When the goats first freshen, I milk twice a day as the demand for milk is high. I feed the kids all the milk they can hold. I've yet to have scours with this method. In fact, one blog post I just read said they have scoured calves on cow's milk but never on goat's milk. I don't know about cow's milk since I don't have a cow but as for goat's milk, I haven't scoured a calf giving all I had. I've fed up to 10 quarts a day to a single stout hungry calf. The goat kids on the other hand eat until they can't eat anymore up until they are six weeks and then I ration their amount of milk so they will start eating more solids hay etc. I figure a kid eats all they can get off their mom. I feed four times a day to weak kids which includes a night feeding and then quickly taper off to three times a day and then twice a day by a week and a half. Those night feedings and three times a day takes more out of me than it use to.

After the goats, I'm usually feeding a calf and later when it's weaned, I might feed pigs with the milk. This year, I don't plan on feeding a calf or pig and hope to get more in to making cheese. I'm not very skilled as my experience being mozzarella a few times, Feta - lots, a Mexican cheese - quite often, cottage cheese - sometimes and that's about it. Oh, yeah, rubber cheese once. I didn't use a recipe from a cheese book and tried one out of a self-sufficient cookbook. Casein in cheese is what gives it the rubbery texture but mine went way beyond to rubber ball level. The kids had fun throwing it at each other and bouncing it around the room. This year, I want to learn to make an excellent cream cheese, perfect my cottage cheese, and learn to make a thicker yogurt if it's possible to do without adding powdered cow's milk-YUCK, (tried it once) or gelatin. My experiment last week with making goat milk yogurt in a crock pot, I'd consider a failure but that's another story. And that's not including making as much butter as possible. So Elaine yes, I milk twice a day most of the year.

Since you mentioned that you had four Nigerian goats that means that you will be getting on average according to the Internet 2 - 4 pounds of milk per day compared to 8 in the typical dairy breeds. I'm getting far more than that. Your yearlings producing far less than your older does. I have found the goats peak in milk production between two to three months after freshening. Don't know if that is due to my milking habits or what because I couldn't find out the statistics on the Internet. Okay, I did find information from the University of Florida but I'm questioning the data just a mite since in the same breath they said that at this peak of 45 to 60 days when the goat is producing the most milk, you breed her, and she kids twelve months after having the last set of kids. Moo...! Sounds more like cow to me since the gestation for goats is 145 - 155 days. Everything else that I read seemed correct on the site but I didn't read the whole article.

Can't you just hear Chicory say, "Hello... aren't you going to milk me. Quit taking pictures."

The biggest reason for milking twice a day is the more demand for milk, the higher the production. When my daughter was having trouble producing enough milk for her daughter the lactation consultant said nurse, nurse, nurse every couple hours and drink, drink, water,and that would stimulate production. That's why some dairy's milk three times a day. It uses up the dairy cows far more quickly and the nutrients in the milk are not proportionally greater milking three times a day for it is mainly water output that is increased because of the stress on the animal.

So, I'd say definitely don't milk three times a day unless you are trying to quickly increase milk production. I did just that when one of my Saanens aborted twins. This was just a few weeks before full term and the one twin was normal in size, the other one must have been dead in the uterus quite some time. I milked three times a day to bring her up to production (she milked very little at first) then when she was milking well, I backed off to two times a day. It was this choice or going months without milk since it was April and she normally didn't come in to heat until October or November. Then there was 150 days pregnancy time plus almost two full months of the kids taking most all the milk. That's a lot of time she would be eating and not producing milk.

As the lactation progresses less milk is produced. It is particularly noticed when my goats milk output drops dramatically when they come into estrus. Then again my Saanen's become quite emotional and cycle hard. They about run you over when you open the gate and then they take off on a run to find the nearest buck with me calling, "Slow down!" while trying to catch up. When they've gone across the road to Michelle's and I've made a grab for their collar, they then head across the other way and head out a couple rows over to the last known buck territory. I usually corner them some where in this vicinity.

This dramatic milk production drop lasts from two to three days. Since Nigerians are cycling 12 months a year, I don't know how that effects them. Could be partly why they produce less milk that the traditional dairy breeds if my goats are any indication.

Consolation prize is that as the milk level drops later in their lactation, the butterfat level increases. It can go up to as much as double what it is in the beginning months of production. That is why I love to make butter at this time of the year when my girls butterfat levels is highest and... the ice cream and the... I've some great statistics on this that I will share next week.

In the cold winter months when I breed my does is when I drop my twice a day milking. The girls aren't producing as much and so it's comfortable to skip the night milking. It means I can get back to my warm house quicker since chore time is shorter. Yeah!, especially when the temperature is in the single digits like it is suppose to be this weekend.

My production is dropping now and I'll dry the does up for two months before kidding. Sometimes I do three months on an older doe if she's been producing lots of milk all year. I might change my mind on milking once a day when I learn to utilize my milk better. Especially since I learned these interesting facts from the Journal of dairy Science. When pregnant, a doe does not drop in milk production for the first 8 weeks. Then that story changes significantly at 10 weeks and increases as the pregnancy progresses. The scientists are guessing this is because of the increase of estrogen, also the competition between the kids and milk for glucose. More kids the doe is carrying the more her milk production will decrease. Also, goats bred at 29 weeks lactation decreased in milk production far more if milked once a day than if milked twice a day. I'm sure this has to do with demand.

Chicory is trying to tell you that if I don't milk as often then she gets gypped. In other words she doesn't get as much grain.

Nigerian goats produce 2-4 kids normally and 5 is not uncommon. That's a lot of estrogen increase and glucose demand. Not to mention a goat population explosion. Some breeders I read, breed their does for 3 kiddings in 2 years. Of course with does cycling every month of the year, it might be hard to prevent this. Yup, good thing they aren't a beef. Now that Tinker Bell has started cycling, she's learned to jump fences, out of ours and in to other people's.

Now that I've done my research, I just might change some milking habits around her. Especially when I learn to use my milk more efficiently making cheeses, ice cream, etc. etc. But the best advice I could give you I think is to keep your doe numbers down to where you can utilize the milk best, whether it is feeding pigs, calves etc. or even the chickens and of course the two of you. I hope this gave you food for thought Barb. It certainly did for me. Thank you for asking me the question of whether to milk once or twice a day.