Frequently Asked Questions
What is a raw milk herd share?
Raw milk cannot be sold in the state of Virginia. However, it is perfectly legal to enjoy fresh, raw milk from your own animal. By taking part in a herd share, you are purchasing a share of a herd that you are then entitled to receive milk from. You pay an initial herd share price and then a monthly boarding fee for the care of your share. Milk can then be picked up on farm or at designated pick-up locations, in the amount of the share you choose, and bottles returned to be sanitized and refilled.
Why raw milk?
Proteins: Raw milk is a complete protein
Fats: Raw milk contains hundreds of different fatty acids, including omega-3s and conjugated linoleic acid (CLA)
Increased bioavailability of nutrients including vitamins A, B6, B12, C, and D; and minerals Ca, Mg, Zn, and Ph.
Digestive enzymes: Raw milk contains anti-inflammatory and digestive enzymes that are lost during pasteurization.
Beneficial bacteria: Raw milk contains beneficial bacteria that protects against pathogens and contributes to a healthy flora in the intestines
How long is raw milk fresh?
Many sources will say 7-10 days. We personally like to say around 7 days. Beyond this, raw milk does not “spoil” as store bought milk will, instead it begins to sour or clabber, after this point it won’t taste sweet to drink, but is great for baking or culturing!
Drinking raw milk for the first time?
It is important that you take progressive steps to introduce raw milk into your diet successfully. It is not recommended to switch “cold-turkey” from processed store-bought milk to raw milk, especially if you have never had raw milk or if you have known dairy digestive issues. You’ll want to make a gradual transition using BOTH the milk you were previously using and raw milk.
Begin by mixing raw milk with processed milk in small increments, for example a few tablespoons of raw milk mixed in your glass of processed milk, gradually shifting that ratio over a week or two until you feel comfortable with all raw milk.
Do not mix raw milk and processed milk into the same storage container. Instead use milk out of both containers to pour into your glass or bowl of cereal, etc. Or at most mix together what you are going to use for just that meal.
Shake the raw milk container to be sure the cream is mixed in with the rest of the milk.
We have more detailed information on this topic on our herd share member login page, much of which we have sourced from Pasture’s Delights, a raw milk dairy in Decatur, Indiana and a valuable raw milk info resource. They offer a detailed 10-day plan for transitioning to raw milk that you may find helpful. Follow the link below…
Transitioning to Raw Milk (3dcartstores.com)
About our herd…
We milk a dairy herd of 24 cows, containing a mix of breeds, including mostly Holsteins, a handful of Jerseys, and one Red Holstein/Ayrshire mix.
What do you mean by lab tested?
Generations of our family have safely enjoyed farm fresh, raw milk from our herds here for decades. While we are advocates for raw milk and the ability to offer this experience to our shareholders, we are still fully able to understand and appreciate the science behind pasteurization. But let’s break down a few things…
Pasteurized grade A milk that can be purchased in stores has been, in the most basic of terms, heated to kill any harmful bacteria and pathogens. Pasteurized milk is then held to a standard of <10 cfu/mL of coliform bacteria, and <20,000 SPC (standard plate count) bacterial count.
We have invested in on-farm lab testing capabilities to test for coliform bacteria, including e-coli and other gram-negative bacteria, as well as standard plate count bacteria loads. Essentially the usual disease-causing suspects. We hold our raw milk to the same coliform bacterial count thresholds of post pasteurized milk (milk that has been pasteurized for consumption), <10 cfu/mL of coliform bacteria, and we follow the Raw Milk Institute’s even stricter SPC (standard plate count) threshold of <5,000 cfu/mL (15,000 fewer colony forming units than what is acceptable in pasteurized milk).
For transparency and accountability we update our lab test results weekly, here on our website, for our shareholders’ assurance. We value these results as a reflection of our herd’s health, grazing environment, and our milking procedure cleanliness standards. Not only that, but we want to ensure that our shareholders are receiving milk that is more than safe to drink, if not safer and more nutrient dense than what you would buy from the grocery store shelf.
What does “grass grazed” mean?
Our cows’ diet is primarily grass based. Our herd grazes on pasture approximately 9 months out of the year. Their diet is supplemented throughout the winter and into spring with grass forage/silage while natural pasture is not as productive, all of which is grown on our farm. We refer to our herd as “grass grazed” as opposed to “grass fed” because “grass fed” implies that they are fed grass ONLY, and our cows are fed a small ration of grain during their milking time each day, as well as being fed a combination of grain and hay as young calves.
What is A2A2 milk?
Milk contains either A1 or A2 beta-casein protein. It has been suggested that individuals with digestive sensitivity to milk are able to digest A2 protein more easily. We breed our cows through artificial insemination. We are actively working to breed for a fully A2 herd, meaning when we chose semen from bulls to use for breeding, we have a plethora of trait information at our fingertips regarding the bulls we choose from, one of those traits being beta casein protein A1 vs A2. Once we feel we’ve reached a fully A2 milk herd, further genetic testing of our cows would be needed for confirmation. Reaching a fully A2 herd may take us a few years and a few generations of heifers. So while we aren’t fully there yet, it is a work in progress, with most of our current milk cows actively being bred to A2 bulls. We will add though, that much of the research on A2 milk hasn’t been fully conclusive, this is an ongoing topic of debate, but many individuals with digestive sensitivity to milk have been known to find success and benefit from raw milk alone, regardless of it being A2 milk or not. Since raw milk is completely unprocessed, all of the enzymes that aid in the digestion of dairy are 100% bioactive and available to the body as opposed to half that in pasteurized milk.
Is your farm organic?
While we have no qualms with organic farming, our farm is NOT certified organic, in large part because we don’t feel the need to be. One primary component of organic dairy farming is that cows are never to be treated with antibiotics. Plain and simple, we disagree. Just as any human, family pet, etc. if for some reason a cow ends up with an infection that warrants antibiotic treatment, we treat them, and do so under the supervision of a veterinarian. Antibiotics are not used for any other purpose on our farm and they would never under any circumstances be present in our herd’s milk. This point we cannot stress enough, because this is a widespread misconception concerning dairy. If a cow is being treated with antibiotics for a given, necessary reason, her milk is then milked into a separate milk can and dumped for a specified number of days during AND after her course of treatment in order for her milk to be well beyond free of any antibiotic remnants. If you are/ever have been/know of any breastfeeding mothers, the same goes for humans, if you’ve ever heard the phrase “pump and dump” that’s exactly how it works with dairy cows, the cow is still milked for her health and comfort, but that milk is thrown out. We believe treating with antibiotics when necessary is a matter of humaneness, if you as a person had an infection within your own body you would seek out the same help from a physician. No matter how healthy an animal or their environment, things happen, and we believe in helping them heal. This need does not occur often on our farm, to give you perspective, in the last year we have only had one occurrence of a cow with a clinical mastitis infection needing treatment.
In addition to the antibiotic component, we feel that regardless of organic certification, the standards we uphold already provide a mostly natural environment for our herd, they graze on untreated pasture roughly 9 months out of the year, are supplemented with extra grass forage/silage in the colder months into spring, are fed hay grown on-farm from untreated hay fields, and don’t receive anything artificial that isn’t necessary to their health. We grow our own corn that is chopped and stored to ferment for corn silage, a nutrient rich grass forage for dairy cows, as well as winter cover crops like rye and sorghum Sudan grass that we also chop, ferment, and feed. These are the forage supplements our herd receives throughout the winter months while pasture is not as lush. When planting corn specifically, we choose varieties of seed that have been modified to resist herbicides and spray only one application of herbicide at the onset of the corn’s growth to protect from weeds and ensure a healthy crop. Any other land management applications we practice include spreading our own herd’s manure onto our fields as fertilizer, the use of lime to neutralize soil pH, and the replenishment of naturally occurring soil nutrients such as nitrogen, phosphorus, & potassium, to balance soil components for planting, with the use of soil sampling to apply these factors only where needed. We utilize no-til farming practices and cover crops to protect the soil of our crop fields from erosion and run-off. All of these practices mentioned we employ in good faith in effort to maintain the land and provide thorough nutrition to our dairy herd year-round.