Testing

Cora Belle is on milk test. This is where you milk the goat under supervision of a certified herd tester. Then the tester weighs the milk and takes a sample to send to WDHIA for analyzing things like butterfat, somatic cell count, etc.
Luckily I have a really smart herd tester, Cathy, who I like to call the goat judge. I'm a herd tester too and even after taking the class several times my paperwork comes back all scratched out and corrected. Not my tester. Her paperwork comes back with everything in the proper place.

And there is a lot of paperwork to keep it all official.



Then under the watchful eye of the milk tester, Cathy, I milk every last drop out of Cora Belle in the morning and exactly 12 hours later in the evening.



That means Cathy must come all the way back and watch me milk and collect the second sample.

The milk is weighed. Blurry picture, good weight!



A sample is drawn, filling the container half way to leave room for the evening milk sample. Then it will be sent to the lab. In a few days I will receive a breakdown of her milk and the amount will be recorded. When she dries off, WDHIA will send the information to ADGA and hopefully she will earn herself a star by her name.



At the end of the day, Cora Belle milked 6.4 lbs of sweet candy milk so tomorrow I'm making cheese.