Comment from Mrs. KT

Excellent

Hello, Mystery Writer!
Wow! What a process, and one that I can appreciate. While my grandparents were not dairy farmers, they were farmers nonetheless, and I don't believe folks today would believe the hard work that goes into running a finely-tuned farm.
I so enjoyed reading about your experience with the surge milkers.

Thank you for sharing!
diane

 Comment Written 01-Dec-2023

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reply by the author on 01-Dec-2023

Thank you. Milking is much easier and more sanitary these days. Most farmers now have milking parlors, which are all automated. That's why I was so happy when we went to the parlor. The cleaning process in parlors is automatic, too.

Comment from Bill Schott

Excellent

This piece, Surge Milkers, introduces me to an item that I will actually never see again. Not that I've seen it or want to see it. Sounds like this part of raising cattle is instruction and assign to another.

 Comment Written 01-Dec-2023

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reply by the author on 01-Dec-2023

Thank you. Surge milkers were probably a blessing to all farmers who milked by hand way back then, just like the automated parlor was like heaven to me after using the milkers.

Comment from Wendy G

Excellent

An excellent entry for the contest. We know farmers work hard but that is a huge amount of work to be done after each milking. And that's just one activity on a farm. The work is never done. Well written. Best wishes for the contest.
Wendy

 Comment Written 01-Dec-2023

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reply by the author on 01-Dec-2023

Thank you. The work was hard to the extreme when we first started. I remember climbing forty-foot silos and throwing down enough silage to feed sixty-some cows every day. This was on top of the milking, cooking, and yard work. Phew, it's no wonder this seventy-seven-year-old body is tired.

Comment from Navada

Excellent

I live in a region famed for our dairy farms and orchards and yet I never knew this - I'm a townie. Thanks for the clear explanation and for teaching me something. I do understand that dairy farming is back-breaking work with very long hours.

 Comment Written 30-Nov-2023

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reply by the author on 01-Dec-2023

Thank you. Milking is much easier today with automated parlors. The cleaning process is automatic, too. I recall climbing forty-foot silos and throwing down enough silage for sixty-plus cows every day, too. Life is much easier on the farms today.

Comment from Carol Hillebrenner

Excellent

I may be one of the few on here to know about surge milkers. My husband milked cows all the way through high school and has told me about it several times. There was a lot of work, as you point out, with the milkers, but doing them all by hand would be even more work. This is a very informative article.

 Comment Written 30-Nov-2023

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reply by the author on 01-Dec-2023

Thank you. It was a busy, but interesting life. I don't think this old body could stand all the work it did then. LOl

Comment from Daylily

Excellent

Wow...I had no idea how much work was involved in just keeping the milking equipment clean. I can see it is important though, since otherwise a whole dairy herd could become infected. -- I also wish I still had a lot of the things I used to own way back in the day. They could probably pay for an exciting trip to some place exotic! :-)

 Comment Written 30-Nov-2023

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reply by the author on 01-Dec-2023

Thank you. It was more a matter of selling clean milk. A milk inspector would show up when one least expected it and check all the equipment used in the milking process. Even the tank where the milk was stored was checked. The tank was emptied every other day by a milk truck, which made it easy for the inspector to check the inside of the tank. Our first tank had to be cleaned by hand, but the second one had an automatic cleaning system. The milk hauler took a sample of the milk, which was tested for bacteria and antibiotics at the processing plant. Spiderwebs were not allowed in the barns, so they had to be swept clean every week. No wonder this old body is tired.

Comment from Debbie D'Arcy

Excellent

That really does sound like a challenge and a half and, although I didn't know about the extent of the cleaning process, I might have guessed that it would have to be very rigorous. But your story brings this aspect of farming to life in an interesting and well expressed piece which I enjoyed. Thank you for sharing and good luck! Just one thing - you've put an extra 's' on milkers in the title description. Debbie

 Comment Written 30-Nov-2023

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reply by the author on 30-Nov-2023

Thank you, and thanks for catching my oops. I have edited and corrected the error. The word count was too short to give a truly vivid description of the milkers. We also had to lift the milker after it was full and dump it into the milk conveyer. Sometime those milkers full of milk could weigh clost to seventy pounds. At least I had good muscles in those days. Lol

reply by Debbie D'Arcy on 30-Nov-2023

You're welcome!

Comment from Wayne Fowler

Excellent

You did it!
I learned something. Of course I'd seen film of them, or something like them, and expected they'd need cleaning, but nothing like you've described.
My grandmother switched from dairy to hogs when I was just a toddler. My mom had the stories, but I had no memories.
Best wishes.

 Comment Written 30-Nov-2023

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reply by the author on 30-Nov-2023

Thank you. If the word count had not beens so low, I could have given a more vivid description of the milkers. I think some of the Amish still use them.

Comment from jim vecchio

Excellent

You taught me something I didn't know. Good thing you had a picture of a surge milker or I wouldn't have understood. Perhaps, for the feeble-minded like me, you could also explain a milking parlor. Also, there is a need for two minor grammatical corrections. 2nd and 3rd paragraphs have parenthesis that need to be closed over the first word of the phrase.

 Comment Written 30-Nov-2023

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reply by the author on 30-Nov-2023

Thank you, and thanks for catching my errors. I will edit and correct. A milking parlor is a totally automated milking system. The one milking the cows doesn't have to bend over as the cows are on a platform. All I had to do was clean the udders and put the milker on the animals. When the cow was done milking, the milker came off and hung itself up. When the milking was completed I filled the sinks with water and chemicals, switched the buttons to wash mode, and the whole system cleaned itself. It was marvelous. All I had to do was hose the floors down, which was a piece of cake.

reply by jim vecchio on 30-Nov-2023

It still sounds like work to me! Thanks for teaching me something new!

Comment from Terry Broxson

Excellent

So far, I think this is a most interesting contest! I think I may be learning some things, but I wish I rather not know. LOL. I mean no offense to your story or your writing, which is very good. But, dang, this sounds like a lot of work. I am glad to know someone other than me was doing it. Good job milking, cleaning, and writing. Terry.

 Comment Written 30-Nov-2023

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reply by the author on 30-Nov-2023

Thank you. I knew there must be someone on here who had used, or knew of the surge milkers. It was a lot of work. The milking parlor cleaned itself except for the floors. It was heaven after those surge milkers.