How Did We Get Here - Part 2

Once again, my romantic notions were quickly tempered. His kind, but honest account of all that would be required to put my dairy dreams in motion woke me from the sort of sheep-centric fugue state I had entered. What was I thinking? My daughter was just seven months old and we were still very much in our own little bubble of codependence. The farm we were leasing at the time was entirely unsuitable for a large amount of sheep and would require significant structural upgrades. My maternity leave would be ending soon, and our financial future was uncertain, not to mention the small detail that I had never even seen a dairy sheep in real life, never mind milked one.

That seemed like a good place to start. Begrudgingly setting my full-fledged dairy aspirations aside, I focused on what I could do - and so, I bought some dairy sheep.

A local farm was having a dispersal sale, which included a few East Friesian ewes. I purchased two, both in milk and with their lambs weaned, meaning I would be stepping into the role of sheep milkmaid immediately. I had years of experience milking goats and cows by this time, and was not at all daunted by the change of species - the principals would all be the same.

Or so I thought.

As it turned out, milking a sheep is not quite like milking a goat or a cow. With cattle and goats, the teat placement is more or less at the ‘bottom’ of the udder, but with sheep, they are at more of a 45 degree angle. This is an awkward placement, made even more challenging by the size of a typical sheep teat, which is usually very small. When hand-milking, one generally uses the thumb and forefinger to encircle the teat where it meets the udder, thereby trapping the milk into the bottom of the teat before tightening the remaining three fingers in quick succession to ‘push’ the milk out. The other technique is referred to as ‘stripping’ and is generally used to get the last drops of milk out. In this instance one pinches the top of the teat with their thumb and forefinger and slides down to the bottom, expelling the milk. This is also a useful technique when milking very tiny teats, as it’s impossible to get a proper multi-finger grip.

I wasted no time in purchasing a milking machine, a Simple Pulse, to be exact. With this new addition, milking was a cinch, however my struggles were far from over. For some reason, that I never did fully comprehend, these particular ewes were extremely discontent. I had been told that East Friesians were sweet sheep with calm temperaments who generally enjoyed being around people. The two ladies I had acquired however, were relentlessly noisy, skittish as heck, and generally just completely unenjoyable to be around. Things did not improve with time, and I rehomed the pair to a friend, sold the milking machine, and officially ended all of my sheep dairy dreams. For awhile.