Homemade Goat-Milking Equipment

Milking your own dairy goat is a rewarding endeavor. A bountiful milker can give you up to a gallon of milk a day, plus kids for sale or meat. There's a perception that goat's milk tastes funny, but if you follow proper procedures in handling the milk, you won't notice a difference in flavor from cow's milk. Goat milk doesn't separate naturally, so to get cream, you have to use a cream separator. Before and after you milk the goat, you must clean the teats and udders. You can do this with a homemade solution of hot water and a few drops of dish soap. Once you have a milking pail, a milking stand and containers to store the milk in, you're ready to milk and reap the rewards.

  1. The Milking Stand

    • Place your milking stand far away from the buck's pen to make sure offensive odors don't contaminate the milk.

      The first piece of equipment you need to build is the stanchion, or milking stand. This gives the goats a place to stand and you a place to sit, whether you're milking by hand or machine. The stand can be made of wood or metal and usually consists of a platform at a comfortable level for both you and the goat --- goats jump well, so don't worry about building it too high --- a neck capture and a grain pan.

    Milking Pails

    • You need at least one half-gallon or gallon stainless-steel container. Never use plastic as it's difficult to sterilize and can pass bacteria and offensive flavors back into the milk. An old stockpot, a container meant to hold flour or any stainless-steel container without flaws that could harbor bacteria can be used. Milkers sometimes filter as they milk by placing a cloth over the milking pail; others filter after milking.

    Milk Cleaning and Storage

    • Immediately following milking, the milk must be filtered if you didn't do it while milking. You don't need to buy expensive disposable filters. Instead, you can use boiled and rinsed cloth or a reusable coffee filter made of fine metal mesh --- but be sure to buy one for this purpose, not one that has been used for coffee. Store the milk in glass jars, never in plastic, and chill as soon as possible after milking. The longer the milk stands at room temperature, the more bacteria can grow in it, creating off flavors and odors and possibly a health hazard. There's no need to buy special jars: Glass canning jars work just fine.

    Homemade Milking Machine

    • It's possible to build your own vacuum milking machine with an air-conditioning pump from a car, hoses, a glass jar and pieces salvaged from surge milkers. This isn't necessary if you're only milking a few goats, as you don't save any time over hand-milking. Once you have a dairy herd, however, you may consider this a worthy investment of your time and effort.