Milk Help

wistful · #1 01/23/08, 09:10 PM

Hi all!
Newbie here, needing some advice. I have a (mostly) jersey cow, second freshening (overdue to be rebred) whose milk has develpoed an off taste. It isn't as sweet as before, and after about 12-24 hours it gets strong. It's more in the after taste, not unlike milk that's starting to turn...sorta reminds me of goat milk. (where's the barfing icon...no offense to you goat milk lovers) She was on c.o.b. and alfalfa pellets for feed, and I know that alfalfa can make milk strong, but it didn't get bad until after the frost killed off the grass this past fall. We cut out the alfalfa a couple of months ago and added extra oats, barley and molasses, but it hasn't helped. If it's from the alfalfa, maybe while she's milking off for the winter it's in the stored fat? (ok, I'm grasping...) I've gotten suggestions from weeds to bad genetics. We've had a milk cow (or three) on the place for 40 years and never had this problem.

wistful

DaleK · #2 01/23/08, 09:15 PM

Could be weeds, could be feed. Could be bacteria in the milk. Get her cultured through your vet and see if she has picked up something, E. Coli, prototheca, whatever.

wistful · #3 01/23/08, 09:19 PM

Thanks! If it's something bacterial, would it affect those of us drinking it? No one's had any reaction at all...

DaleK · #4 01/23/08, 09:23 PM

Depends on what it is and how much of it she's shedding.

BeltieBandit · #5 01/23/08, 09:44 PM

We had a similar problem, that we attributed to our cow getting into some noxious weeks, such as wild onions. It was during a rain shortage, so the animals were foraging into areas they might otherwise have skipped if the grass was fuller. It usually went away after a few days though. I know, not anything new, but that was our experience.

wistful · #6 01/24/08, 09:47 AM

Thanks to you both! I'll be putting in a call to the vet as soon as they open this morning. The infection idea makes more sense as I think back over the past few months. She's always had more 'attitude' than our other cows, so it didn't raise any flags when she seemed to occasionally get 'picky' about her feed (she likes to fuss about all sorts of things). Lately she has lost some of her 'spunk', which would make sense if she's fighting something, but we were attributing that to the fact that we got rid of the one cow she was vying for head of the herd with, as well as just growing up.
Thanks again!

ozark_jewels · #7 01/24/08, 09:59 AM

Agree with the above posters. Also, since I don't know you or your situation, I have to ask......is there any *possible* way she could be bred(bull jumped fence or anything) and preparing to calve?? We have a friend who thought the milk tasted a little "off" for a while......the next week the cow dropped a calf.

It was "off" alright....it was colostrum! Turned out the neighbors bull had been sneaky.

wistful · #8 01/24/08, 04:55 PM

Not bred now, but funny you should ask. This is the cow that ended up bred (for her first time) without us knowing in '05 by the neighbor's bull, but was never missing from home. She was at the barn morning and evening, and the only thing we could figure is that it happened through the fence...barbed wire even! The neighbor usually keeps his bulls in a pen away from our fence line, but... We have had a bull make it to our side occasionally, but they don't go home without being forced, and we never saw one! We hadn't been paying close attention to her heats as she was too young (too small) to breed, but thankfully we are close enough to our animals to have noticed when her udder started to fill out!

I called the vet this morning, and he will be here tomorrow to give her a physical. He did say that he suspects that since none of our others are "off", and since we have a closed herd, it may just be 'her'. Strong mik isn't that uncommon. I do want to rule out any problems before we have her bred however, so if she's fine, we'll breed her for beef and let the calf have the milk. Thanks for the input!

francismilker · #9 01/25/08, 12:09 PM

Wistful, I struggled with the same thing you are last year with a couple of cows and never came to a conclusion on how to change it. My best educated guess is it's your feed unless she's got a slight case of mastitis.

ilovejerseys · #10 01/25/08, 01:57 PM

Mastitis would be my first guess, but we have one cow that her milk tastes absolutely awful when she comes in heat. Guaranteed! Sometimes it will even smell bad. But we definetely know the taste. (We AI'd her yesterday!)

Kelly

wistful · #11 01/25/08, 08:38 PM

Well, the vet came out today, and the good news is that there doesn't seem to be any thing wrong. The bad news is that there doesn't seem to be any thing wrong....

She didn't have a temp, her insides checked out fine, no signs of any infection, etc... The bad flavor has been going on since early fall, and we've tried changing her feed, but no luck. We've never noticed a change when she's in heat, and she hasn't had a bit of mastitis this whole freshening. The vet said go ahead and have her bred, and that whatever the trouble is may go away next time around. If not, it's just 'her'. Guess my angus/jersy/shorthorn might get to be the new milk cow.
Thanks for all the suggestions...any others are still welcome...
wistful

francismilker · #12 01/25/08, 08:52 PM

Wistful, That angus/jersey/shorthorn will probably make a fine milk cow. Some of the richest milk I've ever had came from an angus.

wistful · #13 01/25/08, 09:28 PM

francismilker,
we actually did milk the angus mix for a while this last spring (she's half angus, and the other half is mostly shorthorn, a little jersey). It was her first freshening, and we wanted her to be broke for milking in case we needed her. We left the calf on her and shared, but after the jersey freshened, we decided we didn't need so much milk, and quit. My dad, who was a die hard guernsey guy for years (until I started changing things), even said the angus milk was better. Butterfat/cream is less than jersey, of course, but I swear it was sweeter. It sure raised a huge calf, anyway! Thanks for the input!

Hey, while I'm at it, does anyone have ideas on what to feed a cow in the stanchion when you want to stay away from grains? We quit the alfalfa thinking it was the taste problem, and don't know how to keep the protein up when there's no grass. They have hay all winter outside, so hay inside doesn't make 'em so happy (the jersey will turn around and glare if she doesn't like what she's offered...sometimes she'll eat it, sometimes not). We're using oats, barley and molasses now, but would prefer not to. Ideas??

JulieLou42 · #14 01/28/08, 02:00 PM

I have one milkshare owner who says that my 3/4 Guernsey x Angus milk is better than Brown Swiss. Surprised me! She should calve by the end of this June, with a Guernsey sire.

Feed just alfalfa pellets? Or...

wistful · #15 01/28/08, 03:23 PM

JulieLou,
We went to the alfalfa pellets this past freshening, and it was sometime after this change that our strong milk problem came up. As it looks, it may not be as related as we thought, so we may just go back to the pellets, at least in part. Spoiled by the cost of bulk oats/barley though! The 50# bags of alfalfa pellets are over $13 at the local feed stores, and the place we get our bulk grains doesn't carry them. Could you PM me? I have a question for you!
wistful

wistful · #16 01/28/08, 03:31 PM

P.S.
Julie, I PM'd you first...(I figured out how)

Tam319 · #17 01/28/08, 03:36 PM

My cow's milk started tasting a bit "off"...not really rank or horrendous, but definitely off. I bought a California Mastitis kit and did the test. She was subclinical in one quarter...just enough for it to be noticeable to me but not a raging infection and no clots or stringiness or blood in the milk. Nobody else in my family had noticed it til I mentioned it (I used to be a dairy taste tester at a butter plant so my "palate" is a bit more "edu-ma-cated" about funky cow taste than DH's LOL).

wistful · #18 01/28/08, 06:04 PM

Tam,
So what exactly did you notice in the taste? We've been drinking our own milk for years, and the best way I can describe the taste is very similar to what our home made butter would taste like (when we made it from unpasturized cream) after it sat out on the counter for a couple of days too long. Not rancid, but that strong taste right before. What's funny is that I seemed to be the first to notice it, and after I had fits about it, some of the kids decided they could tell.

Shoulda kept my mouth shut, except I wanted to fix the problem! Another thing is, some of the drinkers hardly notice! Maybe I should apply for your old job!
My biggest question is, when your cow tested + , were there any other signs, like acting sick at all? My vet didn't want to bother with milk testing as he figured that if it was affecting the taste as bad as I said, she would be acting sick... I will look into it now, however! Thanks!!!

wistful · #19 01/28/08, 09:25 PM

I just ordered a CMT to do a milk test, but decided I'd try to figure it out while I wait for it to get here. (Neither feed store in the area has them...small town, non farming region....) Went to the barn tonight and milked each quarter into it's own container. If it's coming from one (or two) quarters, hopefully I'll be able to tell!?! If not, I'll do the test and go from there. Thanks for all the input!!!
wistful

Tam319 · #20 01/28/08, 11:28 PM

Was just a tiny bit tangy and salty is all. The CMT has a little chart that tells you how severe it is (ie. the thicker the gel, the worse it is). Her's was very mild and just that one quarter was effected.

Yes! You should become a butter taste tester!! LOL You kind of have to swish it around and "savour" it like a wine taster, but much less glamourous. It is amazing the cowy, barny or sanitizer tastes you can pick up. I was doing it while pregnant with my first and that really put me off butter for quite a while.

Reminds me of that scene from the movie "Napolean Dynamite" when he is tasting the milk and says "This cow got into an onion patch". LOL

OH YES, and my cow was NOT acting sick in any way. There was not even any heat, swelling, lumps, hardness or anything in that quarter. Just enough to cause a lil funk in the milk and it was straining a tad slower than usual through the filter but no big chunks or blood or strings in the milk. This was at the point when I was getting ready to dry her off. I stripped her out good, administered dry cow treatment in each teat and let her be. So as far as treatment if you want to keep on milking I am no help.

And I know what you mean about not telling the family. What a mistake that was for me! They were guzzling it down like it was liquid gold before I made mention of the "subclinical mastitis" then they acted like it was poison. LOL