Oh, we milk them. Well, we milked our Alpine doe, these two have not yet been bred for the season. Our goal is to time the birth of goat babies to be end of August, so we will be breeding Skylark at the end of March. We will have fresh milk for our consumption about two weeks after that. Pepper will get bred about the time that Skylark births so that we can enjoy fresh milk year round.

Yes, raw milk is wonderful. And raw goat milk is delicious as long as it's fresh and processed correctly. When it ages, it gets 'goaty' and I agree...that is some nasty stuff! When it's fresh, it tastes pretty much the same as cow's milk. In fact, it tastes better and to be honest, I'm not really a milk drinker and yet, I will drink this. Goat's milk can also taste 'goaty' when fresh if there is a buck in close residence or if super clean procedures were not used in processing.

Alpine's have a milk that is about 2.5 - 3% butterfat. Nigerian Dwarfs have a much higher butterfat content that can be as high as 7%!! (for comparison, whole cow's milk is 4%). We will be making cheese, butter, icecream and of course, milk (that has been skimmed - I can't drink 'thick' milk ). Plus, I can't wait to have babies on the farm again!