Hard Hill Farm

TAME DAIRY AND CROSSBRED COWS AND HEIFERS FOR HAND MILKING AND CALF REARING

 Keeping a housecow for milk is becoming more popular and can be a great experience for the family and the cow if all involved are calm and content. It’s no fun, unsafe and hard on the animal when trying to handle wild cows at close quarters and something (or someone) usually gets broken. We pride ourselves on the temperament of our girls and have spent a lot of time taming and handling them to get them calm and quiet around people. They are still big animals and, like everyone, have their own likes, dislikes and stubborn days so they are not guaranteed as “bomb-proof” but we aim to have them quiet enough that they can patted and  milked in the paddock and become part of the family. Most are also trained to be led or tied up with a halter on (no tethering please!) to make their routine care stress-free.

While we originally began with dairy stock, we have found that beef X dairy breeding, such as Angus/Friesian or Angus/Jersey, still provides enough milk for a calf or two plus the general requirements of a family or for home cheesemaking, etc while having beefier calves for sale or the freezer.

We try to match your requirements with the cows’ personalities so please contact us if you would like to view any of our stock for sale. We are located between Castlemaine and Daylesford in central Victoria and can usually deliver within a reasonably local area (and also to North East Vic where we often have stock on agistment).

***SALE LISTING- February 2010***

Most of the girls have gone to new homes locally and are enjoying the pampered and secure life of a quiet cow. Black and Petra and their calves are enjoying the green grass near home while Vixen is keeping a family in milk near Kyneton and Violet and her 2 boys are in Scarsdale. We only have 2 girls left for house cows, half-sisters out of top Friesian milkers by a stud Angus bull and born in late 2006.

“Violet” SOLD SOLD SOLD nearly 3 and a half now,  calved in October- a big shiny Angus bull calf- and adopted a Friesian poddy as well, see photo. She has appointed herself as the “nurse cow”of the herd, feeding any calf- we got a great photo of her with four happy calves having a drink. She and her calves have just been moved  to a paddock of their own to protect her from so many hungry mouths and she is on hand feeding to put some weight back on. She loves a pat with her breakfast and is halter trained but can be handmilked with nothing more than a bucket of feed to restrain her.   She is vaccinated, drenched and NLIS tagged and the calves have been tagged, vaccinated and marked.  The trio is $1100.

“Fuzz” calved to our Dexter bull on the 7th of April and didn’t have any trouble with her first labour (all of Ned’s calves have been born in less than an hour from the start to finish!) She is shiny and fat and very well grown; calving nearly 6 months later than the others she has had more growing time and her little black Dexter bull calf is growing well. She has heaps of milk and is currently being halter trained and brushed each morning and proving herself very milkable. Fuzz is $990 including GST and is vaccinated, drenched and NLIS tagged.

“Kit” calved in early July last year after jumping the fence to the bull 3 months earlier than her sisters. Her calf is a massive steer that she has poured milk into and who now stands bigger than his mother! He has just been sold, weighing in at over 360kg at 9 months of age and was the heaviest of all my steers at sale. Presuming he was 40kg at birth, he grew at almost 1.2kg/day which is exceptional for a calf from a heifer. Kit is having 3 months of R&R to do the growing she missed out on by calving early. She has a very quiet gentle nature, is rejoined to calve from midAugust and will be available for sale in June.