[Sca-cooks] kumiss

[Mark.S Harris]

UlfR replied to me with:
> Mark.S Harris <mark.s.harris at motorola.com> [2001.12.14] wrote:
> > I've also heard that there is a differance between milking a
> > Mongol pony and say a Percheron or Clydesdale....
>
> As long as you stick to the mares it should be fairly similair...

I guess. So long as the mares are agreeable. But it would seem
that trying to milk something that is not happy about it could lead
to a much more serious injury with a Percheron than with the
smaller Mongolian horse.

I think I was thinking of this statement in my kumiss-msg file:
> I have a friend who's family raises Shires, the biggest horse in existence,
> but she has yet to talk her father into milking one of them. This is a
> daunting task on even as horse a small as the ones common to the steppe,
> and even more so on one as large as a Shire. She once told me of a foal
> their mare had that stood nearly eleven hands at birth. That's a big baby.
>
> Corun

However, reading further I do see that the Mongols did develop various
methods to make milking a horse easier:

> "Cosmos, that is mare's milk, is made in this way: they stretch along the
> ground a long rope attached to two stakes stuck into the earth and at about
> nine o'clock they tie to this rope the foals of the mares they want to milk.
> Then the mothers stand near their foals and let themselves be peacefully
> milked; if any one of them is too restless, then a man takes the foal and,
> placing it under her lets it suck a little, and he takes it away again and the
> milker takes its place.

Stefan, the keeper of esoteric info