First Milking

I started milking a couple of days after Ruby was born. Ruby only sucks on one teat. I milk the other three daily now so that Daisy doesn’t get mastitis. In the barn where I milk there is a head catch just for milking cows. Catching daisy was difficult. She didn‘t want me anywhere near her or the baby. I got her in the barn and she went into the far corner. I held one end of the halter’s rope in each hand. I rapped my hands around Daisy’s neck. She started pulling me out of the barn. I grabbed the rope in a loop around her neck and pulled. She stopped and I got the halter on her face. I put her in the head catch and tied the rope to a post just so she couldn’t get out. I put a hobble on her back legs. Daisy had never been hand milked before I started doing it. She kicked at me every time I touched her. My method of milking was closing my fingers around her teat at the top and working my way to the bottom. She stuck her foot in the bucket three times and kicked it over once. I put the milk in one and a half gallon ice cream buckets. It took me three hours to get a fourth of one of those containers. I was exhausted. The walk up the hill from the barn to the house was horrible. I was dreading milking the next day.