How to milk a cow
Wholesome Dairy Farms’ technique for milking cows to provide the best udder health.
24 Responses to How to milk a cow
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Wholesome Dairy Farms’ technique for milking cows to provide the best udder health.
Are you related to Mr Peterson?
MrJopo357
July 28, 2012 at 10:37 pm
Wow!
I am a foreign graduate small animal vet, sitting CPE exam for licensing in the US. I found your video clip while I am studying. Thank you for this video and also perfect milk. 😉 I’d love to visit your farm someday.
SeonahJo
July 28, 2012 at 11:31 pm
I recommend these procedures for all herd sizes. A properly prepared cow will let down milk more readily and increase parlor throughput in the long run. I worked with these procedures as a veterinarian for herds much larger than 200 cows. This will help herds with 40 cows as much as herds with 4000 cows. This is not my opinion, but my experience.
healthycows
July 29, 2012 at 12:30 am
Normally, I’d been in the barn now. Washed udder, milked cows, controlled milk, prepaaring samples, and everything else that comes with it. Instead, I’m quite tipsy, and have fun watching others do the job!
gulis4u
July 29, 2012 at 1:22 am
I read about your store from an email from Woodsong Hollow. I never got to the farmers market when you were there, so I want to visit your store. I live in Harleysville.Do you think you will be at the Farmers Market after Feb. The email said no skippack market till after Feb. 2011. When will you have your cheeses?
DeeDaRary
July 29, 2012 at 2:17 am
don’t milk it
william462
July 29, 2012 at 2:56 am
nice job stimulating those teets! Keep up the good work!
mikeyhomie3000
July 29, 2012 at 3:27 am
Heavens to murgatroid! You’ve milked this subject for all it’s worth. This video is definitely “cream of the crop”! And I’m not just buttering you up! Hopefully your cows will never go dry…that would make them UDDER failures…or at least MILK DUDS!!!
JubalCalif
July 29, 2012 at 3:34 am
That man is passionate about milk!
transammike
July 29, 2012 at 4:24 am
Thanks for your input. I agree completely; the three “E” factors of milk quality are Environment, Equipment and Employees. I demonstrated the “employee” part only on this video. To be complete, the video would have to cover facilities management for environmental cleanliness, and equipment maintenance with an annual NMC evaluation.
As to your wise comment on consistency, I also agree. Consistency, even when the practices are less than optimal, beats periodic perfection every time.
Thanks.
healthycows
July 29, 2012 at 5:00 am
I am a dairyman in Iowa with 40-50 cows. U did a good job demonstrating in the video. (I see u picked a gentle cow too, lol!) I sometimes get a little sloppy on my prepping on the cows after awhile so its a refresher to watch this video. I just wanted to note that we had alot of masitis trouble due to a worn out vacuum pump in 2004 and our cell count has been high ever since. So equipment is important. Also keeping consistent 12 hour intervals or 8 hour intervals between milkings helps alot
Joel19751
July 29, 2012 at 5:33 am
Thank you!
healthycows
July 29, 2012 at 6:10 am
Thanks for your encouragement. I will try to get to making a cow health video.
healthycows
July 29, 2012 at 6:31 am
Wow your workers must love you!! But we do almost the same steps.. And we milk 180+ so its good fun! Thank you very much for making this info video.. Could you make one or 2 on cow health.. and that we DO NOT abuse the cows.. cus i really cant stand that stuff..
oakstorm
July 29, 2012 at 6:43 am
We pre-dip and strip while the other cows are milking. This means that since we are in a tie stall, the time limiting factor is the machine-on time for the cow that is being milked at any given moment. We use four visotron units, so we prep four cows while four are milking. The dip and strip time is something like 10-20 seconds. I actually stand around a lot during milking. Maybe I should get another visotron unit or two! Why don’t you prestrip?
healthycows
July 29, 2012 at 7:37 am
all we do is dip and wait like 30sec and wipe and how fast do u guys do all of this stuff?
damaionw
July 29, 2012 at 8:06 am
Thanks for your comments. The cows don’t kick because they are not in pain or afraid of pain. Pain results from faulty equipment or poor prep procedures. The reason we pre-strip is to prevent infections, and is part of the reason why we have our counts the way they are. Every dairy should pre-strip without exceptions. We can raise our expectations for milk quality and animal welfare. In doing so, we raise the expectations and confidence of the consuming public. It can and should be done.
healthycows
July 29, 2012 at 8:12 am
The physiology of the cow is the same whether the group number is 40, 180 or 12,000. With a well stimulated cow, machine on-time is reduced, thus improving parlor efficiency. Also, properly prepping a cow takes less time than treating one with mastitis. The steps that I outline here are consistent with those put forth by the National Mastitis Counsel. These steps are also consistent with steps that I have routinely recommend to herds as large as 7,000 cows. Herd size is unimportant.
healthycows
July 29, 2012 at 9:11 am
try milking 180+ cows and do that to every cow i dont think so
damaionw
July 29, 2012 at 10:06 am
Milk let-down involves a hormonal cascade in the mother that leaves her feeling calm and at peace. Women report a slight stinging sometimes associated with let-down, and we might presume that cows feel this sometimes also. But at its worst, normal milking would not be what I would call “painful”. There are a variety of disease conditions that might hurt, though. Fast milk let-down is a sign that the cows is well prepared for milking. It is best to have the milk machine finished quickly.
healthycows
July 29, 2012 at 10:49 am
I didn’t realize so much went into milking cows. I actually learned something from this video. Thank you.
BTW, does that machine hurt? I ask because there seemed to be so much milk coming out so fast.
Jeffieboi
July 29, 2012 at 11:41 am
Usually, my coliform counts are <1 cfu/mL. The laboratory that I use has a minimum detectable threshold of 1cfu/mL for coliforms. So I guess another way of saying it is that I usually have no detectable coliforms.
My Standard plate count similarly is usually below detectable threshold at <1200 cfu/mL.
My somatic cell count ranges between 110k/mL and 230k/mL, depending on season, number of fresh cows, etc.
I never have had any human pathogens like H7O157 or salmonella etc, show up on my tests.
healthycows
July 29, 2012 at 12:28 pm
jimmytricky: Thanks for your comments. You make a good point that contamination can happen at any step in the preparations before machine attachment. The way that I avoid contamination by the cloth is to: 1) use one cloth per cow; 2) hot water wash and bleach the used towels; 3) completely dry the towels before use–never use damp towels!! 4) store the clean towels is a soil proof container until they are ready to use.
I agree, tissues are a good alternative to cloth.
Thanks!
healthycows
July 29, 2012 at 12:44 pm
I would buy that man’s milk. Good to see a dairy vet so passionate about his job.
blahdiblah98
July 29, 2012 at 1:02 pm