Dairy Sheep Symposium - the Department of Animal Sciences ...

MILKING EQUIPMENT FOR DAIRY EWES
Yves M. Berger
Spooner Agricultural Research Station
University of Wisconsin-Madison
Spooner, Wisconsin
Introduction
Milking can be done by hand with ewes standing on an elevated platform or by milking
machine in parlors of various levels of sophistication. All methods and techniques, however,
share the same principles of emptying the udder as completely as possible, without causing
trauma to either the udder or to the teats, in the shortest possible time while keeping the milk as
clean as possible.
It is very important that milking be performed rapidly, in an environment as clean as
possible, in a well lighted area, designed for the best comfort of the milker and of the animals.
As in many other countries, the conditions in which the milk of cow, goat and sheep is
produced and collected in North America are subjected to many regulations to ensure that the
highest quality of milk is sold to consumers. The location of the milking parlor, its design, the
material used for construction, the quality of the water for cleaning the milking equipment and
many other details need to be respected in order to obtain the milk producer license.
Before starting any type of construction or installing any type of milking system, a producer
should contact his/her local dairy inspector in order to be aware of all existing regulations.
For example, in the United States, stanchions cannot be built with porous material
such as wood.
Types of milking parlor
Hand milking (less than 20 ewes)
Hand milking is still very popular in many Mediterranean countries where management
systems, labor resources and energy resources (availability of electricity) are quite different than
in other countries. A shepherd can hand milk between 20 to 60 ewes per hour (sometimes more)
according to the milking ability of the breed and the milk yield of the ewes. Until 1950, a man
could milk only 20 Lacaune ewes per hour in France, which at this time did not have a good
milking ability, but could milk 80 ewes per hour in Corsica Island because local breeds were
easy to milk.
Because of the generally small size of sheep dairy operations in North America, hand milking
could be a very viable option. It is simple and does not require any sophisticated equipment. In a
small scale operation equipped with a milking machine, more time is spent in washing the
equipment that in actual milking. However, hand milking requires a certain know-how that might
no longer be existing and might not be appealing to the modern producer. Moreover, it is difficult
to get clean milk because of possible contamination of the milk by external agents.