Challenge ‘udderly’ fascinating
Emma James spends an early morning milking cows for our Reporter Challenge series.
enough pressure and the cups kept falling off, but once I got the hang of it I got into a steady rhythm and did three cows in a row.
Milking the group separate means they lose production time, but will ultimately gain back with better, healthier animals.
Lewisridge farm milks about 1150 cows on their 350 hectares - 30 of which is fenced off with riparian planting.
The team begins putting cups on cows just before 5am every day, and again at about 2pm. Each milking session takes about three hours.
‘‘You’ve got to have an appropriate break between milking to allow the cows to go out into the pasture for a bit of a graze,’’ said Chris.
I stopped after three cows, satisfied with what I had done and not wanting to do anything wrong.
Chris said farms are heavily regulated.
‘‘We’re harvesting milk, it’s a nutritional product and any day we can get tested on it over 300 dif- Have you got a challenge for Emma? Send ideas in to emma.james@fairfaxmedia.co.nz. ferent tests.
‘‘If we get it wrong we get graded and that could mean a loss of $20,000 or more.
‘‘It’s a high stakes game, and people probably don’t realise that we’re regulated from when the cows leave the paddock and come into the shed until they go back into the paddock,’’ he explained.
The milk then goes into the vat, goes to the factory and gets processed.
‘‘It all has to be done by the book, and they still test it in China and America at their port to make sure it’s safe before they allow it into the country.’’
At the end of my milking attempt I smelled and looked like manure, literally!
But it was fun, and gave me a different perspective and appreciation for what milkers deal with.
Thanks for having me Chris. I’ll be leaving it to the professionals from here.