Advice Sought

Tango, you are going to need a lot of butterfat for all the butter, ice cream, cheese, etc. I would definatly go with the jersey, they have the highest and best butterfat. Skim all your milk, and give the skim milk to the hogs.

I apologize, I answered someone else's questions and missed yours! We're milking our Dexter, she calved 2 weeks ago and we've been milking a week. We only milk in the morning, the calf is with her the rest of the day and put in the cow shed at night. We're currently getting a quart and a half every morning. We're new to milking and so is our cow Bridget so we aren't pushing it. I'm guessing we could get a half a gallon a morning minimum right now. It should go up as she goes along. Dexters are supposed to have a high butterfat ratio but I'm not seperating the cream yet. I would think a Dexter would meet your needs without overwhelming you.
Patt

A calf will nurse as long as his mother will let him. If he has an obligeing mother this can get pretty ridiculous. A cow will lactate a long time if you keep milking her but production will go down the longer you do. I've heard of people milking for over a year but the milk production is quite low at that point. You need to dry the cow off ususally after nine or ten months of lactation so she can build up condition before she has her next calf. Dexters seem like ideal milk cows for a homestead in a lot of ways. Less milk is good for a family, less feed is good for a budget, smaller size is good for fences and buildings. I've seen some claims on how much milk they give which seemed a little hard to believe but what do I know. The main problem with them that I can see is finding a gentle one. The huge majority of Dexters are NOT MILKED by their owners. They are raised pretty much like beef cattle, out on pasture with little human contact. This is not the system for raising a gentle milk cow. If you by a heifer or cow raised like this you will have to do some training and gentling to get her to stand to be milked. That may be a hassle. Also I believe certain bloodlines of Dexter give more milk than others by a lot. Some Dexters won't give enough to color you coffee assumeing you can milk them in the first place.

As far as milking the cow and letting the calf take the rest this works sometimes and sometimes it is an exercise in misery. Some cows will and some won't. It depends on the cow. Every cow is an individual and you won't know until you try. Some cows, perhaps a majority of them, won't let down milk to a human if they are also nursing a calf. Others will with zero fuss. You'll just have to see. Jersey's are supposed to be better at this but I know of a lot of Jersey's that won't do it reliably either. So you have to take your chances.

As far as finding a nice milk cow who is gentle and tame you probably would find a jersey much more easily. But she will give a lot more milk and be a bigger cow and eat more feed than a Dexter. So you'll have to figure out what you can find in your area.

Mine has been great!
On days when I require more milk, I separate her from her calf a couple hours before milking, and give her a little extra grain.
When we're drowning in milk (2-1/2 gallons a day adds up fast for two people! ) I skip the grain and leave the calf in her pasture.

As a first-time owner, I've had a really good experience buying a cow that's "retired" from a commercial dairy. Tango, if Jerseys are being used in commercial dairies in your area, I'd recommend going this route.