The Most Wonderful Awful Goat in the World

Any of you who have followed my blog know who Prissy is. She is the goat who gave me triplets then immediately rejected them, leaving me no resort but to milk her twice a day and bottle feed them. Not such a bad thing, except milking her meant bloody knuckles, sky rocketing blood-pressure and the need to go before the throne of the King of Kings apologizing for the things I called one of His creatures. She can buck, kick and lift a metal milking stand up off the ground with her head locked up and both hind legs hobbled and chained to the floor. If she had been my first dairy animal, I would drink tea.

The only thing in her favor is the fact that she was giving a gallon and a half a day. After raising the triplets, I took her down to milking only ONCE a day and was still getting 3 quarts of milk at a time. Then we got the bummer lambs. I got to enjoy this little routine again, twice daily and she went back up to giving me 5 quarts a day. Not bad. Then I weaned the bummer lambs and she had to nurse Moose, the monster calf. Him she didn’t kick and fuss about, which I found highly offensive. Once Moose was doing better, I kicked him out to the pasture and actually milked her for a couple of weeks for my OWN use, then my cows freshened and I kicked her out in the pasture and tried hard to forget the trauma she had caused me.

It has been a month now, and she hasn’t been milked or nursed, but her bag is still abnormally large looking. The other doe, Scarlett, has been nursing her twins a little on and off.

A new couple has been hired on at the ranch, and they have a 10 week old baby who has some sensitivities. His mother told me she was advised to try raising him on goat’s milk as the formula she has to buy is very expensive. I told her we would see if we can get enough milk from the goats and if so, I will teach her how to milk and process the milk for him.

We brought Scarlett in and barely squeezed 4 ounces of milk from her. No matter, its noon and she may have more tonite, as the twins might have already tapped her.

Later, Prissy showed up bellowing and bellyaching because she was out in the pasture alone…with 22 other animals…but no Scarlett, as we separated her. I decided to drag Priss to the milkroom just to see what that big bag was all about.

I got the old battle axe up on the stand and after it stopped going airborne on me…I had a half gallon of milk in my bucket. Looks like the little feller is gonna get his goats milk after all!