When we had our raw milk dairy there was never a thought of “do we have enough milk?”. I was able to make whatever recipe I wanted, and knew I always had that milk supply available. But since we closed the dairy it’s been a different story! There have been many times that we haven’t been able to have exactly what we wanted due to not having milk. That’s not a good feeling when you are self sufficient in most other ways! So this week, we decided it was time to utilize these goats we have.
When we first started milking years ago we started with one goat. Hannah will always hold a special place in our hearts as our first milk animal. She was patient and did a great job teaching US about how to milk. We enjoyed her milk and because of Hannah, we moved from one goat, to two goats, to a cow, to two cows, and eventually to the dairy.
When the dairy closed and we sold most all of our cows we found we had a new problem. Who was going to eat all that grass in the pastures?! So a couple of years ago we bought a small herd of nubian goat babies from a friend and local goat dairy. Why did we choose nubians? Well, we had them before and we knew that nubians were gentle, easily trained, and people friendly. Over the last 2 years that herd has become all of those things, done their job eating grass, and has continued to multiply. And that means……goats in milk! While we haven’t wanted to milk any of them before now, these changing times have made us rethink and realize that we do indeed have a milk source on the homestead and we need to get going again! Now there are several things that have made it easier for us go back to the stringent schedule of milking twice a day- first, both of us being home full time again sure makes it easier to keep to the milking schedule. And like many Americans in the midst of this pandemic we don’t want to go to the store right now if we don’t have to. So adding milk of any kind back to our homestead production is a natural solution. We are weaning off the kids from their momma’s and Millet and Latte will go into production. I’ll be able to have enough milk to cook, make cheese, and most important add to our coffee!
But with all that said, and even with easily trained goats, it’s a whole lot easier to milk when you have the right tools. Fortunately, we still have all of the milking items from the dairy- cleaners, teet dips, buckets, machines, etc.- but when we had the cow dairy we sold our goat stanchion to another family. And, as older homesteaders, getting all the way down there to ground level for goat teets is a little difficult! So we started looking around the homestead to see what kind of supplies we had that we could use to put together a new stanchion. YES! We were able to find everything we needed sitting around- praise the Lord that we have a well stocked homestead and don’t have to run to the store for every little thing! I’m so glad that we have places to keep all the leftovers and overstocks that we have had over the years. I can’t tell you how many times we go to those when we need something. (if you have a homestead, or just want one, learn to live frugally now- don’t waste anything- you never know when you might need it!).
So we set up our work table, got our tools and supplies, and set out to build a new goat milking stanchion. And honestly, it took less time to build the stanchion than it is going to take me to write and edit this post! Here is our pictorial, along with some basic measurements, on how to build a goat stanchion-
First step, gather your supplies-
Measure your goat (we will give you some basic measurements for the stanchion, but it was important to make sure that Millet and Latte would fit well on what we were planning to build)-
Cut and assemble the legs. The front legs are substantially longer that the back. Our dimensions were 20″ for the back legs, and 60″ for the front. The total length for the side pieces is 48″.
Next step- attach the platform. We used boards that were about 12″ wide and cut them into pieces 19″ long for the platform to be 19″ wide. We added the top cross bar to the tall front legs at this time as well to help it stay together. That piece was also 19″.
Now that you have the legs and platform done, it’s time to do the detail work for the feeder and head gate. Note, we had an old feeder that wasn’t being used, and an extra piece of the poly-chain that we use around the goats necks. Again, saving some of those things can really come in handy when you need them! If you don’t have these things then be creative- you could attach a bucket, a bowl, and could use any kind of chain, rope or even hay string.
At this point you will add 2 additional cross bars to the front of the stanchion. One will go down by the platform for added strength and to attach the head gate, and the other will go up not quite 1/2 way for the feeder to be attached to.
Now you will attach the head gate. You will measure the length for these from the bottom cross bar (where they will attach) up to a point higher than your front legs. The extra length here is to be able to grab hold of the head gate and latch the chain. So just far enough for you to comfortably do this. We did a lot of “how does this feel” testing when constructing this part.
One side of the head gate will be permanently attached, and the other side (the one with the chain) will be attached on that bottom cross bar with a bolt and nut so that it can move. In our pictures, the piece on the right is movable, see the bolt attachment below. The piece on the left is stationary.
Once you have these pieces in place, and an additional cross bar between the leg pieces on the back side. This creates the pocket for the moving head gate to slide through.
Finally attach a piece of chain the the top of the moving head gate piece, and a nail to the top of the other side to hold it.
Once you do that, your stanchion is complete! You are ready to train your goats and start milking! And once you have that milk, you can make delicious soft cheese- read our recipes here! Enjoy!
Do you want to know more about goats, milking, or do you need to purchase some milking or homestead equipment? Click HERE to head over to Amazon.
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