So far as the cow herself is concerned, none needed, other than at most, a windbreak of cedars or pines.
But, if you're going to be milking this girl 2X daily, I'd certainly want a little milking shed. with a headcatch and feed trough.
Probably will need at least some sort of outbuilding for hay/feed storage.

Thanks for the reply. Another question, though. We've got right at one acre of "pasture" fenced. I assume it's just regular, whatever grass out there. What do I need to do before I put a cow out there to graze so that she doesn't eat it all up and ruin it so it can't grow anymore? Do I need to seed something out there, cross fence, or what? I'm hoping to get a smallish Jersey cow.

So..do you live in GA or UT?
Without seeing your pasture - and what forage species are there, as well as what % of the sward each component comprises, no one here can really make a good recommendation as to what you need to do.
Contact your county Cooperative Extension Agriculture agent - that's what he/she is paid to do, advise farmers/homeowners on how to do things best.

For a milking cow, you need some sort of shed to hold her still while you milk, keep you out of weather, sun or wind. This will help keep milk clean, stanchion lock with manger to feed cow, keeping her quiet while milking.

For pasture, you should always break it up, so you can move her to another area, rest the first one. You need a sacrafice, mud/loafing area so you can keep her off the soft dirt, new grass, of season changes. Leaving her on new grass will allow her to cut it terribly with her sharp feet, destroy the turf. Part of this sacrafice area MUST be clean and dry for her to lay down, chew her cud every day. Easier, faster to clean her udder if not mud caked, cleaner milk if cow is not dropping dirt particles as you milk her. So a barn or shed is needed.

You can probably graze her on a couple acres if grass is fairly lush, kept cared for. If all you have is a lot area, you will need hay and storage for it. Cows make the best milk with feeding some grain, the best hay and lots of it.
You can cut a couple acres up with fence, do a rotation grazing, moving her every couple days, then mowing the grazed area.

One acre fenced is not enough, even if it looks like a golf course to start. You will have to plan on haying to keep her filled up.

Good grass is kept mowed 5-7 inches tall, not let go to seed. Seedy grass quits growing, no nutrition, nothing to eat. You need to walk the field, make sure the "green" you see is edible vegetation. Seeding, fertilizing, yearly, weed removal, mowing often, are a constant job to keep pasture up to good production. You may need equipment, tractor, disk, mower, to get those jobs done well. Hand work is very hard, time consuming.

Even a small cow needs some space. Not a backyard sized pet. Twice daily milking is an absolute, can't be skipped or late. She will quit producing, get sick if not managed well. Handling the milk takes time, care, space. Cows eat a lot of hay, which you have to handle, get to your location. They drink great amounts of water, can be hard on fences. You will have to get her bred yearly for milk, do something with the calf, who will also need feeding, handling.

Be sure to think everything thru, before you invest. Perhaps go work for a neighbor, milk cattle for a while for other folks.

I have a "smallish" Jersey/Guernsey milk cow. We keep her on 10 acres. She has a calf that we are share milking with. She stays in a 16 X 28 foot pen with a little 10 x 12 milk shed bumped out of that perimeter at night with the calf, then we let her out every morning early to eat grass. She stays out all day, separated from the calf,so her milk will build up for evening milking. We only milk once a day-every evening and the calf gets it the other half. Is working out very nicely. It gives you much more freedom and is much better for the calf. I think it is cruel to take a calf off its mother at a week or so of age. Buster is growing very fast and sometimes presents some challenges, but he is an investment too. We have taken a holiday and left the calf with her all day and skipped milking, We don't do it very often at all. You may have to do a little thinking sometimes, but the cow is a little more flexible than some think. It is much better for the routine to keep the holidays to a minimum, but all won't fall apart.

It would be hard to say with your small acreage. I would venture to say that you would need to rely heavily on hay, and grain.

We provide hay 24/7 usually we usually have much more grass than we do now. But we are in a severe drought. In Utah, I would think that would be something that you would need to plan for.

Don't let anyone discourage you, and another thing don't let someone tell you that you need to pasteurize, if you keep a clean and healthy cow, strain the milk and quick cool, you will never be healthier. Your body can digest the milk much better if you drink it raw. ALWAYS have your cow tested for any diseases that your vet deems necessary.

It won't be any cheaper than buying milk, but you and your family will be much healthier! Our family works together and get all our chores done. That is what I like most about milking our own cow, we are almost always all four there Mom,Dad,and 2 brothers. One gets hay while one milks, one shouvels poo, and feeds other animals. We love it! I have never felt healthier either. Good luck! look up "Keeping a family cow" pro boards. Good forum just for milking cows.

Lesli

I was advising on milking twice a day to get maximum milk production. I don't know how much milk the future cow owners plan to get or need. Perhaps they plan to feed calf some, fatten up piglets, or go into cheese making! Those all take milk in quantities.
If milk quantity is not the goal, they might like to look at other small cattle breeds not dairy. Mixed breed beef and dairy. You can milk all of them, just less in the pail.

Leaving a calf on her half a day, will cut your milk production. Cow milk is a supply and demand thing. Nursing a calf uses less milk daily, than you will with thoroughly stripping her bag out with twice daily milking. Calf in half days may or may not, nurse off all 4 quarters of the bag to reduce milk in the bag. Unused milk will pool up in the teats. Overfull quarter may swell painfully.

Modern dairy cattle are bred to overproduce milk for commercial use. Calves don't use all the milk a dairy cow would produce during a day.
If you only completely empty udder once a day, you can set the cow up for mastitis or other problems as time goes along. May never have a problem with your cow, just be aware that the half and half method can cause problems. It is right there with changing milking times around often. Cows just don't do well with that, want same specific times EVERY day for milking. I know health problems seem to crop up more often with the more casual approach to milking time, cow owners. The above are not the best management methods of dairy cows producing a lot of milk.

I see my 4-H background is showing. If you plan to get an animal, plan to do the caretaking job well so they stay healthy and productive.

Pasturization is up to the milk owner. If cow has good results on all their needed tests, should not be a people health problem. Pasturization was required to keep the general milk using public healthy, more protected from diseases and TB carrying cattle.

Not all calves will take much milk especially in the beginning weeks. Ours is a Simmental bullock. He is a bruiser, a good 300+lbs at 2 1/2 months. He would take all the milk if we let him. He empties her better than we can, because our cow holds it back for him. We get around 2 gallons a day sometimes more, sometimes less if my husband leaves the cow with the calf longer in the morning than usual. This keeps our family in milk, and also about 4 other families over flowing in milk, plus I make cheese, yogurt, butter, etc. I really don't know what I would do with anymore. We are going piggy shopping this weekend!

What kind of cow do you keep Goodhors? I am sure that she would probably would make much more if we actually were not in a drought this past year. Last year she could not even make a dent in the grass and clover, this year it has been sooo dry, we barely have any grazing. There are MANY other families that share milk with the calf out there, we have never had a problem with mastitus. There is a good site that has LOTS of people that would argue a few points with you.

Here is a link that might be useful: Keeping a family cow

We don't keep cattle now. However I have done a fair amount of work WITH cattle over the years. Milked Holsteins and did farm work after school for a couple years. We raised beef for a while, helped out my friends in working their animals, 4-H stuff. Some ranch work out in Montana, Wyoming. Lots of farmer/Cowman related discussion of what works, doesn't work, handling, good/bad experiences with many breeds, genders, ages.
Quite a number of bulls around those places. I have been stalked by them while on foot, chased, had to hold down while they got doctored on the ranches. Well trained dog can be a lifesaver! No bulls I wanted to be around!!

The places I worked milked about 100 cows twice daily, lots of young heifers, new calves. The milk money paid a lot of bills, had to be productive cows. This made daily routine critical. We needed healthy cows with good udders to milk. Had to get milk all out to keep production up, not damage the teats, prevent mastitis, take good care of the cows. LOTS of healthy feed and water.
The ranchers were extremely picky about having calm, quiet cattle. Got angry with careless handling by riders, chute folks. They wanted cattle you could walk around in, out in the big pastures, easy to handle for doctoring. One guy wouldn't have any kind of feisty cow or bull. He really knew all his stock. If a cow or bull got testy or rank as it aged, he would go back and cull out all the stock related to the original animal, sell them off. "Bad breeding breeds true" was one of his quotes. Wasn't going to have bad cattle on his place! His cattle WERE exceptional to work with. You watched, but never had any bother us when we had to walk among them to fix a problem.

Some breeds were more testy, got upset quickly with handling, gathering up. Cows DO NOT like being hurried. Dairy cows can get hysterical if pushed hard, big routine is changed, then bad things happen. Usually so calm, easy going, you get careless, complacent in handling.

Cows are teachable, which is why routine can be your friend. I never understood why folks thought that the expression "It will happen when the cows come home" meant never. The dairy cows were like clocks. They came home from pasture at 4:30P EVERY DAY. Ready to be milked.

I like cows, just not a pet like a dog. We named the ones at home.

That was a very interesting story I enjoyed that. Thanks goodhors.

My suggestion would be... before you get a cow figure how much milk you can actually use. Don't dream here. There are dairy sheep and dairy goats, they produce less, but still more than many will need.
There is something inside of me wanting a jersey, but it is not practical!

Not even all jerseys give the same amount. Most adjust to what you/calf are milking/taking. It would not meet most families needs to have a holstein. They give LOTS of skim milk. Hand milking would be almost undoable for most new to cows/milking. My arms and hands are killing me after 2 1/2 gallons. It will definitely put some muscles on you. If I was not keeping my calf on her Daisy would probably give over 4 gallons. Jersey cows give much richer milk in milk fat and milk solids. Jersey cows are A LOT different than holsteins, in just about every way. And nothing says you have to breed the cow to a jersey bull. If you get a beef breed (ie meaning a larger beefier calf) you will more than likely have a calf that can and will take more milk. Nothing says YOU have to take all her milk, some even raise an extra calf on their milk cows. I think it is much kinder and wiser to use a calf to your advantage and leave it with its mama and you will be able to sell/butcher the calf later and it can help pay some of the bills.

Not even all jerseys give the same amount. Most adjust to what you/calf are milking/taking. It would not meet most families needs to have a holstein. They give LOTS of skim milk. Hand milking would be almost undoable for most new to cows/milking. My arms and hands are killing me after 2 1/2 gallons. It will definitely put some muscles on you. If I was not keeping my calf on her Daisy would probably give over 4 gallons. Jersey cows give much richer milk in milk fat and milk solids. Jersey cows are A LOT different than holsteins, in just about every way. And nothing says you have to breed the cow to a jersey bull. If you get a beef breed (ie meaning a larger beefier calf) you will more than likely have a calf that can and will take more milk. Nothing says YOU have to take all her milk, some even raise an extra calf on their milk cows. I think it is much kinder and wiser to use a calf to your advantage and leave it with its mama and you will be able to sell/butcher the calf later and it can help pay some of the bills.

I just got 4 little feeder pigs to raise on skim milk, That is a lot of meat so we will probably sell a pig or two later.

You should get the book, Keeping a Family Cow, by Joann Grohman, it is wonderful and shows you how to make it work, and teaches you everything you will need to know before taking the plunge.