Fresh Milk

 Since we first bought our little block, even before we'd moved here, one of our big goals was to have a housecow.

Milking a cow and making our own dairy products would reduce our weekly grocery bill by about a quarter, so it was always a huge part of the plan.

Brownie at four weeks old.

I'd hoped to milk my Dexters when I got them, I knew they were at least a year away from breeding, and most of a year after that before they were able to be milked so it was never a short term thing.  For all my hard work trying to tame them though, they never got to be friendly enough that it was going to be an option with the facilities I had available.

I hand-raised Brownie from four weeks old, she's a lovely jersey fresian cross.  I always planned to milk her and made a point of staying friendly enough to be able to pat her and have both of us comfortable around each other.

Two weeks ago, she had her calf.  He's been nick-named "Handsome".  He's just lovely with a chocolately brown colour to his coat and the big soft jersey eyes and long eyelashes.

Handsome at a couple of days old.

He seems to be just as friendly as his Mum too.  We never take anything for granted where he's concerned - I've heard too many stories of people being mauled by their housecows for getting between them and their calves, but he's come up to me at the gate and she's been quite unconcerned about us patting him and now that I'm milking her, he quite often comes around the side with me and curls up where she can see him.  When he's not coming up to me to see what I'm doing that is.

I first tried milking her about three days after he was born.  She kicked the bucket and I think it spooked her a little.  I couldn't get near her the next day and the day after that, her behaviour was quite hostile - ears flat and throwing her head around.

Hubby built a rough temporary bail to my specifications and I tried to entice her in with some hay.  We're very dry this year and her paddock, while it still has plenty of grass in it, it's mostly brown and dry.  The sneaky girl was going up the rough old sheep race next to the bail and eating it through the railings.  So I put a load further up the race and she walked in quite calmly.  I blocked her in with a length of wood and tied her leg loosely with a bungy cord.  I couldn't fit the bucket under her because of the railings, so after washing her teats, I tipped out the remainder of the water from the coffee mug I'd carried it out in and milked into that through the railings and tipped it into the buckets.

We didn't last long before she'd had enough and wanted out.  I got about 400ml of colostrum.  But it was a start at a time when I was worried that it wasn't going to happen.  My family were a bit disturbed by the very yellow cream and slightly pink tinge to the milk part.

I found some recipes for colostrum pudding, also known as Beestings pudding and Abrystir - an Icelandic dish.  But I didn't end up making them.  I never quite got the quantity to try it.  But I did make a cheese sauce with the colostrum which went down a treat with my son.

Since then, I've cut a board out of that part of the race and it's working.  She decided she didn't like the wood blocking her in and backed out rather quickly before I got it all the way across one day - nearly crushing my hand between this piece of 4 x 2 and the top railing.  The next day, every time I picked up the wood, she'd back out and eyeball me until I put it down.  Then she'd walk back in, I picked it up again and she backed out again.  So I milked her without the leg tie or wood.

Brownie in the race.

Brownie now.

It was the most successful milking I'd had so far.  So we came to an agreement, I wouldn't use it and she gave me no reason to need it.  I have had her knock the bucket over and on one occasion lift her foot and put it squarely in the bucket, but since then, she makes it clear that she will be moving before she actually moves.  She gives me enough time to shift the bucket, even lifting her foot quite slowly.

About a litre of milk in the bucket.

My best milking this week has been two litres.  From all accounts, that's quite good given that I'm sharing her with her calf and he's only two weeks old.

Now she comes and pointedly looks over the gate to see if I'm coming out yet with her hay.

I have bought a milking machine.  It is a very old piece of equipment and Dad is working on getting it going.  We have parts at the platers to be replated, a new motor and I'm saving madly for a test bucket and new hoses and cup liners.  We are still planning a milking shed to run it in too.  I'm hoping I'm not milking by hand for too much longer, but I'm getting used to it.

Milk heating to pasteurise.

Hubby is a little paranoid about raw milk, so I'm pasteurising it.  It's actually a really simple process.  Heat the milk in the top of a double boiler to 72 degrees Celsius, keep it there for 30 seconds and then cool it to 4 degrees C.  The double boiler is really important - I tried it without one night and scorched the bottom, even though it didn't go over temperature, it still scorched a little.

I'm skimming the cream and making butter with it.  Butter is also extremely easy.  Whip up the cream until it separates into butter and buttermilk.  Press out the rest of the buttermilk, wash the butter and you're done.  I've been mixing it up with rice bran oil to make it spreadable without changing the taste too much.

When I've built up a big enough store of spreadable butter, I'll move on to ice cream.

The family are getting used to our own milk and butter.  I think they're all proud that we're doing it, or rather that I'm doing it and they're all cheering me on.  Hubby needs to learn before I go away for a week at Easter though.

Apologies and Updates

When I started this blog, I made a commitment to myself that I'd write at least three posts a week.  

At first that seemed easy.  I was doing lots of things and had plenty to relate.  Then it started to seem that I wasn't doing anything new and any blog posts would be repetition and redundancies.

But there are always new things I'm learning and constant new experiences.  I've got plenty of patterns and craft ideas going all the time and I'm always finding new ways to preserve food or new ways to cook with it.

I have some new adventures underway and some new experiences to share and mistakes I've made that someone else may avoid after hearing of mine.

Homekill Meat

We had our last Angus steer homekilled.  He was getting to be a bit stroppy and dangerous to be around.  As I'm on my own and on foot most of the time when I'm shifting my cattle, I can't be afraid to be in the same paddock as them.  The odd bit of high spirits when the cows are on heat is different, I know what to expect and that they're going to be behaving in a silly manner.  But a big steer charging at me and throwing his head around is different.  He did stop, back off and settle when I stared him down and I was able to leave the paddock without showing any fear.  Although as soon as that gate was closed, my knees started trembling and the adrenalin rush almost knocked me over.

So it was time for him to go.  More Steak and Kidney pies made.  More suet for the chooks and rendered for cooking.  More dog food and no spare space in the freezer.

At the same time, I had three pigs slaughtered.  One was for a friend.  She went with the cattlebeast to a butcher for processing.  I did the butchering of the other two pigs myself.  This was achieved with the help of youtube.  George, my old boar became mostly ham and bacon.  Stefano my younger boar became a whole range of different cuts.  We had a George ham for Christmas lunch and it went down a treat - everyone loved it.

I ran out of time and room in the fridge for all the stuff I was doing so half a bucket of pork shoulder and all the pork liver ended up buried in the vege garden.

Animals

The awesome neighbour came and tailed our lambs for us.  While he was at it, he gave them a jab for tetanus and pulpy kidney.  The shearer came out one evening and dagged/crutched all five lambs and completely sheared (shore?) the two ewes.  This year, after all the grass seed and dried poo mixed in with last year's fleece, I decided to lay down a tarp for him to shear them on.  It's made cleaning them up much easier.

I'm finally finished washing all my fleece, but I'm still carding and spinning last years wool.  I'm keeping it separated from this years.  Partly because I want to see if the quality changes, or if there are any things I need to be conscious of.

Then I was given nine fleeces of varied colours.  Some black, some grey and some brown.  I foresee some fun times with that.

I've just had three new calves arrive.  Two heifers and one bull calf.  The bull calf is the only one that I really wanted to be a girl.  His Mum is a Jersey Fresian cross and his Dad is a Dexter.  Two out of three of those breeds are known to produce difficult and stroppy boys.

I've been starting to milk Brownie - my Jersey Fresian cow and mother of my handsome bull calf.  This has been met with mixed success and today, nearly a broken hand.  I'm being as gentle as I can, it's new for both of us and I don't want to frighten her away from it.

I've had six broody hens - including one shaver.  It's been a couple of months with no signs of any chicks, so last time three of them were off their nests I took all of their eggs and broke them to check for chicks.  Not even the slightest sign of anything at all.  I'm starting to wonder if 50 hens is too much for one rooster, but getting another rooster proved to be a bad idea last time.  Our next idea is to make a chicken tractor and put the meat breed hens and the rooster in that together.

The Vege Garden

This year the garden has been a dismal flop.  Either the chooks or the piglets which kept getting out ate everything down to ground level or dug it up.  Then the weather turned stinking hot and dry.  The lawn is brown and crunchy, the paddocks are brown and crunchy and it's near impossible to keep any moisture around my plants.

I've had a small handful of cherry tomatoes, a few beans and one zucchini.  I haven't tried the potatoes yet, but the ones in tyres seem to be doing well - they've got huge plants on them at least.

Other Bits and Pieces

We've had to replace so many ballcocks in water troughs this year.  Mostly because the pigs keep getting at them and ripping the brass arm off at the split pin.  You can't fix that, it needs to be replaced.  We've looked at a float system and covering the ballcock altogether, but both have their own issues.

We've begun a process of staking down the bottoms of fences.  The sheep have been pretty hard on them and at one stage roamed freely between four or five paddocks.  The one we've completed (and that was a lot of hard work) seems to have kept most of them contained for now.  Although one lamb can squeeze under the gate and is still roaming.  We're planning to hang a fence post on the bottom of the gate and hope that she's not strong enough to push it out of the way.

I bought a floor loom.  I was chatting to a chap at a craft expo who is in the Spinners and Weavers Guild.  We were talking about looms and I commented that I'd really love one, but can't afford to buy one.  He told me that many people are now giving them away.  It seems that most people just don't have the room for one anymore and they're not selling.  I got mine through him from a lovely elderly couple for just $75.  I was embarrassed that this was all I was able to offer them, but after chatting with them for an hour or so, they were happy it was going somewhere it was going to be used and cared for.

I've put the loom together and made a test piece.  Most of the time involved in weaving is in the set up.  I'm going for a full width piece now, because it's me and I never do things by halves.  I've spent days getting about two thirds of the way across.  By this, I mean just stringing up the long threads that go from back to front.  I'm not up with the terminology yet, so I can't tell you if this is warp or weft or if there is another name again for it.

I've been recommended for some work later on in the year.  As an Artificial Insemination tech.  The tech mostly does the logistics, preparation and documentation for the person who does the actual AI.  I'm keen to give it a go.  The experience, the contacts and certainly the money will all be helpful.

Right now, I'm trying to go back to my plan of at least three blog posts each week.  Miss Nine is back at school and I have that little bit more free time and ability to concentrate without a dozen questions every ten minutes, or telling me about what she's been doing in Minecraft or the Summer holiday "I'm bored" nagging.