I recently did a post called the Top 10 Reasons to Keep a Dairy Goat. While I stand behind all my reasons, I do actually have goats AND a Jersey cow, so I thought it was time Beulah Belle had equal treatment!
1. Personality. They don’t know they are cows. Picture a giant milk giving dog who will lick you from fingertips to armpit if it thinks you have a treat.
2. Ease of Milking. I milk goats and a cow. Amazingly, the cow is easier to milk than any of the goats.
3. The Milk is Amazing. Just amazing. It is so sweet and delicious and unlike anything you will ever find in the grocery store.
4. Cream. Jersey cows give amazing quantities of the good stuff. (Note: they don’t give as much as Holsteins, but their milk is much richer!)
5. Fertilizer for the Garden. The other thing cows produce in quantity is manure. Luckily it enriches the garden and pasture!
6. Calves! So precious!
7. Save on chicken feed (part 1). Chickens love the milk and whey we give them. Feeding it to our feathered friends is certainly preferable to wasting it!
8. Save on chicken feed (part 2). This one may be a bit much for the non-homesteader to handle, but chickens are huge fans of cow manure. It sounds gross, but it keeps the pasture clean, because they spread out the cow-pies while searching for loose grains and fly larvae. This is part of nature’s plan for sanitation!
9. Butter! Imagine the butter you can make when you get inches of cream in each jar! Spectacular!
10. Cheese! Cheese making ranges from seriously simple to extremely complex. Either way, I’m all for a hobby I can eat!
So there you have it! Equal treatment for the dairy cow. She may be bigger than you, and that can be intimidating at first, but she’s a great asset to family farms and homesteads!
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