planning the dairy year
People often ask us, 'What do you do with all that milk?' A better question would be, 'How is any farm or homestead managed without the constant inputs of solar energy made available by a large dairy ruminant?' Grass-derived milk lets you harvest the bulk of your daily solar energy: as milk, as manure, as forage pruning, as animal feed --
So here's a sample of how we use milk:
- January – very rich milk, but lower in quantity: drinking milk, cream for butter: buttermilk and extra milk for animals
- February – still low in quantity, but high in 'components' because of the concentrated food value of hay or stockpiled grass: drinking milk, cream for butter, buttermilk for animals
- March – the hens are coming on to lay; now's the time to make sure there is milk in their diet, for protein and for calcium. If you've dried off the cow for a late April calving, you're really missing your milk just now.
- April – if you're beginning to incubate eggs, or have chicks on order from the hatchery, you'll be glad of extra skim milk and buttermilk for the protein and probiotic boost it'll give your babies
- May – now that the grass is coming on, your cow's milk production is going through the roof! Even with a calf on her, you'll be getting more milk than you know what to do with. Make cheese. If you didn't already have a pig, you need one now.
- June – still drowning in milk, unless you're leaving the calf on her. Were you thinking of taking a short trip? Do it while the calf is still on its mama and let Baby take care of the milking chore
- July – grass cows will diminish in production when the pastures start to get overgrown. Don't let this bother you; the break from processing very high protein foods is good for your cow, and she'll pick up production when the grass greens up in the fall.
- August – if you've extra milk right now, it can a good time for cheesemaking, in between busy days of hay provisioning or garden harvest.
- September – if you're in a temperate climate, you'll probably see fall rains and greenup, with a consequent burst in milk production. Perfect! That pig you maybe brought on in May, if not before, will now come into his own. All your food processing wastes, except the fraction the chickens can eat, will be going down to the pigpen. Surplus milk, buttermilk, and whey are just the things to make sure there's plenty of protein to balance all those vegetables.
- October – now's the time to make cheese again – you've got a good rate of production, some mornings free from the garden, and not too much pollen in the air. Whey and skim milk to the pigs to fatten them for butchering.
- November – I'm still making cheese and butter. Components – the nutrient content of the milk – is high now because of the rich stockpiled grass the cows are eating. The hens aren't laying much, so I don't have to provide as much protein, which is a good thing as milk volume declines.
- December – thank goodness for good rich milk and cream, since we're going through a lot of butter with the Christmas baking. Buttermilk, clabbered and hung in cheesecloth, makes a marvelous spreadable cheese; mixed with herbs and garlic, and rolled in black pepper, this is just the thing to take to holiday get-togethers. There is still surplus milk, of course, and whey, and buttermilk, not to mention the last of the cull apples, cull vegs from the root cellar, and bedding from any animals you have in the barn – you probably need to look into getting another pig.
- January – Black Thought: spring is coming, when we'll be drying off the cow again before calving. But – go without milk? - unthinkable! Maybe we need to get another cow . . .
(excerpted from our field guide Considering a Family Dairy Cow)