> Just ask somebody if cows give milk without being pregnant
Is that... controversial? Obviously a cow normally gives milk without being pregnant. It wouldn't be able to feed its calf otherwise.
Is that... controversial? Obviously a cow normally gives milk without being pregnant. It wouldn't be able to feed its calf otherwise.
But there's so much to the linguistics of animal husbandry and dairy that many folks don't know. It goes way deeper than just the milk-oriented terms in the article: Heifer versus cow, freshening and calving, steer versus ox versus bull, AI (not the LLM kind) versus natural service, the barn, parlor, and pasture, and more. Plus plenty of technical knowledge. If you're not hand milking, how many mmHg of negative pressure should you use? Do you use a surcingle, or a claw, or a robot?
Even in the milk-oriented terms, there are others not covered by the article. HTST and UHT aren't the only options, there's also LTLT. Pasteurization can be done in a pipeline, or in a vat. Smaller vats for home and small farm usage can be multi-purpose: I pasteurized milk and cultured yogurt in mine. Some folks even care about the specific proteins (A1 beta-casein versus A2), which is genetically determined by the cow (and can be bred for).
I got a cow in 2020 and there was a lot to learn.
Not just that. A cow couldn't be a cow if she hadn't become pregnant.
Cows simply produce milk like chickens lay eggs.
Consider how imagery of a farmer inseminating a cow with his arm disappearing up some tract or fitting a spike to the baby so it can't drink its mom's milk -- or farm conditions in general -- are basically shock footage that people are insulated from until they maybe chance upon a movie like Dominion.
The gestation period of a cow is approximately 9 months, similar to humans, by coincidence. Only a cow that has given birth to a calf will produce milk. The normal lactation period is 305 days before the cow is "dried up" before giving birth again. 10,000 pounds of milk is considered a good lactation total. Typically, cows are bred to calve once per year. Typically going through 10 lactations before that one way trip to MacDonald's.
Dairy bulls are notoriously nasty creatures, so artificial insemination is almost universal in the dairy industry. The "tract" that you speak of is the cow's colon. The technician is careful to guide the pipette so as not to injure the animal, and the colon provides convenient access to feel what is going on inside.
If you are squeamish about such things as cow's colons, then vet school is not for you.
e.g. "[They might assume] cows simply produce milk like chickens lay eggs."
It's normal to never really think about it -- our society is set up so that you never have to. The secretion comes in a jug, the meat comes in cellophane, and that's it.
You may have a point that many have no idea how chickens work. Egg laying being like giving birth isn't an unreasonable explanation if you had to come up with one on the spot while completely in the dark. But most understand how milk is produced because even if they've never seen a cattlebeast, they deal with milk-producing humans daily.
These are not sapient beings that are capable of looking out for their own well-being. We've bred that out of them over hundreds of human generations.
Am I misinterpreting you here? You're saying most people think cows are bred (you know, what causes pregnancy), and presumably think that that calves are born — I've never met anyone who didn't know what a calf is, but somehow don't realize that pregnancy happens inbetween?
But that's not how it works. Every single milk-producing cow must have been pregnant at least once, and typically several times in its life to keep producing desired amounts of milk. And the calves are an unwanted byproduct that must be taken away. At least they're not shredded in a big blender like the male chicks of egg-laying chicken breeds are.
Where else are you going to get them from? A calf factory?
> And the calves are an unwanted byproduct
Am I misinterpreting you again? Heifer calves are the prized possession that ensures that your dairy continues into the future. Cows don't last forever (or even all that long).
You maybe had a stronger case for bull calves, but now that modern breeding can select for heifers with ~90% confidence, that's hardly an issue anymore. And, I mean, in this day of age of high-priced beef, even if you get the occasional bull you're not exactly complaining either.
May you expend on this? I know we kinda have selection techniques for eggs to crush them before hatch but I guess that’s not what’s happening with milk caws as the diary is the main target and the cow need to give birth to start lactation. Or perhaps it’s the impregnating technique or some hormone therapy that tricks the odds?
> in this day of age of high-priced beef, even if you get the occasional bull you're not exactly complaining either.
I depends on the breed: in this days of high volume diary and meat consumption, most of what people eat comes from specialised breeds that hare very good at producing milk OR muscle. The non-desired sexed are not so valuable. Switzerland (and others countries I can’t remembers) recently passed a calves handling low to require farmers caring them for a minimum days in response to industrial sloped into unethical territories.
That documentary shows another practice in India : some invaluable calve are just roped to a fence and forget until dehydration. https://christspiracy.com
Huh? A holstein bull calf is selling for around $3,000 right now. That's... insane.
I remember from what doesn't seem all that long ago when fats didn't even fetch half that much. Beef has gone wild. If that's not valuable, what do you consider valuable?
I’m not sure we’re talking about the same data. Here’s the price evolution of lived calves in EU. They happen to be very high since 2025 (300€/500€ for diary/meat) but if you click « select all » on the top left you can see they use to be around 100€/200€ in the previous 10 years, going as low as 60€/head during covid.
https://agridata.ec.europa.eu/extensions/DashboardBeef/LiveA...
> what do you consider valuable
Fair point, I didn’t express it well: I don't think calves “have no value” in general, they’re sentient beings. However, as you pointed out and shown ahead, they are also part of a market and in some places their value is not high enough to care them well [0]. Some of them happen to be euthanized very shortly after birth:
> In one survey of Canadian farmers, an average of 19% of calves were euthanised at birth and of those respondents that euthanised calves, 34% reported using blunt force trauma (sharp blow from a solid object to the head) [1]
There’s also the "bob veal" (2–3 days to 1 month) [2], I guess the goal is to have a different taste but I’m not sure about that.
side note: I found the technique used to "select for heifers" you mentioned: the process is called flow cytometer and it sorts the sperm with a laser.
[0] https://www.journalofdairyscience.org/article/S0022-0302(17)...
[1] https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/veterinary-science/arti...
[2] https://www.britannica.com/technology/meat-processing/Labels...
For the sake of understanding our communication breakdown, what suggests "in this day of age of high-priced beef" is talking about 5-10 years ago?
But that isn't how it was interpreted. We saw the weakest plausible interpretation + silly criticism transpire instead. However, I trust in good faith that it wasn't intentionally interpreted in the weakest way, but rather that it simply failed to communicate its intent.
Which is where I seek an understanding of where it broke down so that I can be clearer in the future.
The communication breakdown also comes from me as we are two in the thread. I should probably re-read "How to Win Friends and Influence People", a best seller that truly changed my relation to others 15 years ago.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Win_Friends_and_Influen...
I think a lot of people don't realize we're hijacking their reproductive systems, instead assuming cows constantly produce milk.
One could argue there's more suffering in a glass of milk than a steak, which makes ethical vegetarianism flawed despite its good intentions.
What I find quite bizarre that in India (where I am from) milk is considered ethically vegetarian whereas unfertilized chicken eggs are not.
But the weirdest experience I have ever had was at the main Google cafeteria. One gentleman with a steak on his fresh plate was quizzing the attendant at length to be sure that the mashed potato was vegan. After many months of thinking I found a plausible reason.
Carnivorous potatoes aren't as tasty?