Jenni Schwegler

I moved from dairy goats to a dexter in the hope doing grass fed milk for our family on our 3 acres of pasture in western washington. I got a sweet heifer but now that I know more I don't think she has good milking genetics. When she miscarried her first I started looking again. Everyone I talked with either bred only for beef or had a dexter as a milker but wasn't getting much milk with a calf around. I ended up getting a dexter jersey from a jersey dairy in her first freshening and so far (since April) she's been great. She loves our pasture diet and is steadily producing at 9 months after freshening. This summer will be my first chance to see how she drops her milk with a calf around but I'm hoping her genetics and milking experience will make it a fairly seamless process. We've also had a great time feeding them pumpkins from a friend's farm for the lady month, which they prefer to all but alfalfa leaves

Hi Adam -

It's great to have you on the forum and I can't wait to read your book (already ordered it)! We live in Snohomish, WA with fairly acidic soils. Your soils probably aren't but I was wondering what you think about liming cattle pasture, or if there is a different biodynamic approach?

On slightly different note, I put a mix of dolomitic lime, sulfur, kelp powder and copper sulphate in with the alfalfa pellets I feed my dairy goats and dexter cow as advised by Pat Coleby in her books on natural goat and cattle care. Do you have any thoughts or experience with this? What minerals do you give your dairy cows?

Thanks!
Jenni

I am wondering if Wardeh or anyone has tips or recipes for making a sauerkraut with collards or kale?