# Any way to tell if a doeling will be a good hand milker?



## Chicks-n-Goats (Aug 29, 2014)

Looking for some advice. I'm going to be getting 2 doelings in the spring. Are there any physical characteristics to look for on a very young doe to determine if she will be a good hand milker? (The dams i have them reserved from have only ever been machine milked) Or is it something that can only be determined once she is milked for the first time? Just curious, I may not even have a choice if they only have 1 doe anyway which is fine, they are from great lines as far as production and breed standards and will be more than worth having regardless. Just a curiosity in case there are things I can look for and they have more than one doe I can choose from.


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## harleybarley (Sep 15, 2014)

The number one characteristic is personality. You'll shape most of that with how you raise her, but do put her on the milk stand sometimes and gently touch her so it's not a big shock when you start milking.

Look at mom's udder and teats. Would you hand-milk her? If not, skip the kid.

If you get a chance, look at lots of babies' teats. There is a difference at birth. If the adults all have "normal" teats, pick the kid with the biggest baby teats. Tiny teats are machine milkable, but (reasonably) big ones are faster to milk by hand. If - rare in wellbred goats - you see huge, long, sloppy teats on any of the goats, don't pick the kid with the biggest teats.

If you have the mom's registered name, you can check adgagenetics.org and see if she (or her parents) had linear appraisals. They look at things like teat placement and orifice size. IMO, orifice size and teat size are the critical traits for easy hand-milking.

Now, whether the kid will produce well - that's a different question! But most of what the kid has will come from mom and dad, so if they have good hand-milking udders behind them, the kid will probably have 'em too.


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## Hollowdweller (May 5, 2011)

Not really.

You could have tried to milk the dam and paternal grand dam by hand to see.

The things I look for in an adult are teat size and delineation, teat placement and orifice size.


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