# My bulk feeder WARNING PIC HEAVY



## keren (Oct 26, 2008)

So in the dam feeding vs bottle feeding thread, someone asked to see pictures of my bulk feeder. As previously mentioned, I rear my kids on bulk feeders with ad lib cold milk. The feeder is an esky or bucket with lamb teats and tubing, I fill it twice a day with cold milk and float some frozen bottles of milk in it to keep it cold during the day. Because it is cold, the kids do not over feed. They only have small amounts at a time, and in this way it mimics the natural feeding patterns they would get if suckling on mum, multiple small feeds throughout the day.

I'll copy and paste some photos and descriptions now, sorry if the descriptions repeat some things I've already said or refer to things not pertaining to this threat, I'm just copying them from my facebook album

I should also say that I'm a girl and never done anything remotely DIY before, never picked up a power tool before now but it was easy to make.










My prototype bucket feeder ... this has traditional lambar teats at the top with a tube going down into the milk. Good for strong kids, weak kids can be a little discouraged as it takes a few seconds of sucking for the milk to travel up the tube before they get it.










Tubes from the lambar teats going into a 1L bottle, since these guys are tiny they arent drinking a whole lot, so I put the teats into the bottle and have just been filling that. This way you can put ice around the glass bottle to keep it cool, especially since this is just a normal 20L bucket, not an esky or cooler. I've managed to get away with the normal bucket for the last couple days because its not very hot here. If you had bigger or more kids to feed you wouldnt use the glass jar, just fill the bucket up. If you freeze some plastic bottles with either water or milk in them, you can float these in the milk to keep it cold during the day. When defrosted, simply empty into the bucket and pop in a new frozen one.










A smaller gravity fed bucket with teats at the bottom. I'm finding this is good for training the two smaller kids, as they get the milk straight away when they suck the teat. No leaks as it is just a normal bucket. It has a couple different types of teats on it, they are very soft 'starter' teats.










Traditional lambar or lamb feeding teat ... you will find these are pretty much any stockfeed or livestock supply store, they cost around $3 - 4. They must be placed at the top of the feeder with a tube going down into the milk, they will leak if used at the bottom of a gravity feeder. They will also fit onto most soft drink bottles if you are bottle feeding. Since this is the teat I wanted my kids to learn to use, I fed them some warm milk from a bottle with this teat before introducing the bucket feeder.










This is the back of the traditional lambar teat, showing the bit where you plug the tubing in.










Lambar teat with tubing attached, 10mm diameter (I think?) tubing from Bunnings, a 5m roll was about $13.










This is an Excal Little Softy teat ... ideal for very young kids, its a 'starter' teat. I have one of these on my gravity fed, 'training' bucket. Cost about $3 - 4 and needed to be ordered in from the eastern states, you can find them online at The Farmers Mailbox, Geoff Andrews Direct or The Farm Store. A really beautiful, soft teat.










Back of the Excal Little Softy teat, it doesnt fit a tube so can only be used in a gravity feed system.










Excal Regular Lamb teat ... basically the same as the Little Softy teat except harder rubber. Not really suitable for young and/or weak kids. Actually even my now 3 mth old kids wont take it.










Back of the Excal Regular Lamb teat, again doesnt fit a tube so can only be used in a gravity feed system.










Generic Lamb Bucket Feeder teat from The Farm Store (online), very cheap at $6 for a packet of six. They are soft latex so really good for starter teats, but I doubt they would hold up to long term use with stronger kids. I have these on the gravity fed training bucket and the kids love them. They also fit inside the opening of a 600ml coke bottle, though I found for some reason the kids would feed on them on the bucket, but hated them on the bottle.










Back of the generic Lamb Bucket Feeder teat, I do like these ones for ease of cleaning since the back of them is so open.










The four different teats I use together. I also use Pritchard Flutter Valve teats (yellow and red) and Excal Topper teats (blue and red) when individually bottle feeding.










22L esky from K Mart, cost me $24










Wood boring drill bit, also known as a spade drill bit. 16mm to drill the correct size holes in the buckets and esky. Cost $13.










Holes drilled at the top of the esky. I discovered when using the esky you have to have the teats at the top. Even if they dont leak at the bottom of a bucket, they will leak at the bottom of an esky.




























Lambar teats pulled through the holes, with tubing attached.










As the kids are drinking more, I've gone from the one litre bottle to two of them. When they are drinking more I will just fill the esky.


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## GTAllen (Jul 22, 2012)

Very nice DIY!! Thank you.


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## JaLyn (Oct 10, 2012)

The only problem i would have with this is putting cold milk in it, baby goats cannot digest cold milk easily. Other than that it looks great.


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## Trickyroo (Sep 26, 2012)

Awesome idea , thanks


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## 20kidsonhill (Feb 28, 2011)

Very nice, thanks for sharing.


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## KarmakeeFarm (Jun 3, 2012)

Great idea!-But yes I also wonder about the cold milk like Jalyn ~
anyone else wanna hoot in on this?


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## mjs500doo (Nov 24, 2012)

Always feed milk warm. Body temp is ideal. However that's just our own practice. Calves/goats alike.


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## JaLyn (Oct 10, 2012)

Actually it's best to heat the milk slightly warmer then you would for a human baby.


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## 20kidsonhill (Feb 28, 2011)

we feed cold milk.


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## JaLyn (Oct 10, 2012)

I did some research before we all got into a cold milk warm milk debate lol..and if i understood what i read correctly if you use the type of feeders keren uses it is better to feed cold milk because it keeps them from gorging which can cause diarhea but if you bottle feed as some do than you would want to heat the milk up because you are controlling their intake. I think i have all this right but please by all means don't quote me on it because i'm not 100% sure i have this right..


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## audrey (Jul 17, 2012)

Awesome!! I know a lady who makes a similar thing when she's raising up orphan foals. She calls it "Cooler Mama" LOL!


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## keren (Oct 26, 2008)

There is no problems with feeding cold milk, they digest it just fine. I have had kids on this system since day 1 and they never scoured, no digestive problems, they actually grew bigger and faster and were eating solids earlier than any bottle raised kids I have (and I do a pretty good job bottle rearing traditionally). Having to feed milk warm is a bit of a myth, and in my experience more tummy upsets are caused by feeding milk that is too warm/hot than with milk that is a lukewarm, or indeed even cold. 

With the cold milk, after they have a drink they puff up their fur and shiver a little bit which takes a while to get used to.

I have also used cold milk in bottles, and they do fine with it too, it helps with the ones who like to gorge their bottle, it slows them down quite a bit. 

I know someone who uses a similar bulk feeder to me but tips the milk in warm straight after milking, twice a day, they dont overfeed even though its warm milk not cold. 

I've been experimenting a bit with kid rearing this year. I did the bulk feeder which I love, I'm completely sold on it. I also tried bottle feeding only twice per day from birth, which worked fine the kids grew well much to my surprise but I didnt like their temperament - they were crazy needy clingy bottle babies. The beauty of the bulk system is that they act like friendly dam raised kids, since they dont see me as the food source they arent obnoxious over the top friendly bottle babies, they are just nice, so easy to handle. The downside to the bulk feeder is they drink WAY more than they would if I was bottle feeding them, I was going through a ton of milk as they were drinking between 2 and 4 litres per kid per day!! Compared to 1.5L that I give them if bottle feeding per day. So it does use a lot more milk. Once they were 8 weeks I put them onto 2 x 600ml bottles per day so I could utilise a bit more of the milk. They kept their nice temperament.


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## JaLyn (Oct 10, 2012)

I'm not sure if you read my last post but I did some research and discovered that said it's better to use cold or lukewarm milk in these type of feeders.


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## keren (Oct 26, 2008)

yeah I did JaLyn, I was trying to explain milk temps for different feeding methods but it may not have come across properly. I'll try again. 

Conventional wisdom says that milk fed in a bottle should be warm, not cold, since it is a large amount and a large amount of cold milk in their belly isnt easy to digest. 
At the other end of the scale conventional advice says to use cold milk in a bulk feeding system since they dont like to drink large amounts of cold milk, they will not overeat. 

In reality, I found that my kids drinking cold milk from the bulk feeder would still drink large amounts in one go - they would suck for a good 5 minutes, much more than I thought they would.
I know someone who puts warm milk into the same systems fresh from the goat. 
I have also bottle fed milk straight from the fridge. 

All of this goes against conventional wisdom, but havent had any adverse effects. Just goes to show goats never play by the rules!


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