Four Questions to Ask Your Dairy Farmer

[karika]

Check it out
http://www.care2.com/causes/animal-w...dairy-farmer2/

[CherryBomb]

Not a very good article. It's obviously pushing veganism and written by someone largely unfamiliar with small scale farming. The premises towards the end are absurd and poorly thought out.

[Sayward]

You're going to get a lot of flack for this. Most people on this board buy into the idealized no-one-gets-hurt 'small family farm' myth. They don't like to think about the ethical paradox or larger implications of their actions. And challenging the myth makes 'em surly. Get ready to get yelled at!

[stik]

I've done it, and consuming plant-based milks and cheeses is really not a way to simplify your life. Non-enriched plant-based milks are nutritionally inadequate for children, and for my family, finding appropriate substitutes and then persuading our children to eat them was definitely harder.

I think the truth is a lot of people already know what goes into dairy farming. The people who are savvy enough to seek out a local farmer and a small operation are especially likely to be well-informed about these issues. It's weird that the author chose to write this article for this particular, already well-informed audience. Production of animal foods is not a pretty process. A lot of people choose to ignore it. A number of others choose to compromise by finding producers who treat their animals less badly than factory farms. The author of this article comes across as pretty naive.

[Magelet]

I don't think those are great questions to ask your dairy farmer, I think it's an article skewed towards converting people to veganism, without looking at it fairly unbiasedly.

Do your cows eat grass or are they fed organic feed?

Ok, it's a decent question. But it's too black and white. Ask the farmer how he feeds. Are the cows pastured? how much of the time? (whether by choice, or because the weather doesn't permit it or because there isn't any good grass sometimes) how do the cows live? what do they eat when there isn't enough growing grass? Do they get grain at milking time? (a little grain as a treat probably isn't a problem. After all, cows eat grass. grains are the seeds of grass. grain is a problem in large amounts, but not a handful or two at milking). if they get a little grain is it organic? gmo-free? local? how about any additional hay they get?

Do you separate the baby calves from their mothers?
The reason farmers take the baby away is so they can steal the mother's milk that was intended for her child.
Many times a mother cow will call out for days trying to find her stolen calf. The sound of a grief stricken mother cow for her calf is heart breaking. Perhaps ask the farmer about that?

yes, they do take calves away from their mothers usually. and the idea is pretty upsetting thinking as a human mom/future mom. but the cows don't always care. seriously, I was talking to my dairy farmer the other day, and he was telling me how the new calf got seperated from it's mother for about 24 hours (I think it left to go explore elsewhere in the pasture), and the mother didn't even appear to notice, nor take much notice when the calf returned. not a grief stricken cow. some cows might be, but they certainly aren't all.
and as for stealing milk, ok, seriously? stealing? maybe it is maybe it's not but by using that language, it makes me not take you seriously. because your clearly very biased.

What do you do with all the male calves born on your farm?

Yup, it's an issue for dairy farmers that as many bull calves are born as female. and hopefully the farmer won't sell the calf for inhumane veal. But honestly, just get to know your farmer. I talked to mine recently, and he said he wasn't sure what he was going to do with the bull calf yet, he hoped to find someone who wanted to raise it for meat. but I know him. and I know he is very unlikely to sell the calf to a feed lot. And yes, the dairy industry isn't bloodless, but it still can be humane. There's a reason traditional people's who ate dairy also ate meat (though only occasionally).

What do you do when a cow's milk production slows down?

I haven't asked my farmer this. I imagine that most farmers do slaughter/have someone slaughter their animals for meat when they get old(then again, most dairy cows are not dual purpose breeds). That's life. Again, the dairy industry isn't bloodless. It's not like drinking milk and not eating meat means no death.

eat plant-based "milks" instead.

My problem with this is that you have this choice to nourish those plants: use manure from cows and chickens (the same industry they were berating above) or use petroleum fertilizers whose run-off creates dead-zones in which not much can live in the ocean. I don't find petroleum to be an ethical choice.


Better questions to ask your dairy farmer:
What do the cows eat and how do they live? (pasture/hay/grains, when etc, it's not b&w, there are different ways to manage it and several healthy options)
How do they milk/chill the milk (and pasturize it if it isn't raw milk)?
How big is your herd? What are the cow's names?
Can I come visit (it's fun to visit. also, it's a good thing to be able to see how your farmer works. the lives of the cows, the cleanliness of the milking barn. whether or not you want to actually go, knowing that you can means that the farmer beleives his standards of cleanliness etc are high enough that he's will to have you see them, which is a good thing)
How was your weekend? (by getting to know your farmer personally, you will be in closer connection to your food, and really, knowing your farmer well is the best way to really learn about your milk. and your nearby farmer. and an interesting person.)

[Arduinna]

New calves do not just wander off to go explore the pasture and not notice where mom is for 24 hours. I've owned dairy animals, including dairy goats and cows, including a jersey that we milked and my husband has worked at a cow dairy. It doesn't happen in cows, goats or sheep, heck even the baby chicks that were hatched by mom know to keep up with her. Who does he think he is fooling with this story? Can they get lost, sure but they aren't just off exploring. The natural instinct of both mother and baby is to stay together and they do call for each other if separated.

[Magelet]

It was a long day today on too little sleep. the calf may have gotten lost. And I didn't say the calf didn't mind, only that the mother didn't seem to mind. I don't recall the story with great detail, perhaps it wasn't 24 hours, I don't know. I think it's far more likely that I am misrecalling the story, than that he is making up a story to fool someone. It wasn't a "oh this is a story to explain that it's ok to seperate mom and baby" it was a "this was something funny that happened on the farm this week". Please don't think badly of him/his farm just because I possibly mis-remembered an anecdote.

sorry, it's been a long day. I got up much too early and it's much too late.

[avendesora]

I asked a dairy farmer if they separate the babies from the cows. The answer was something like this:

Yes. The calves are very rough on the teats. They can't milk the cows without hurting them if the calves are roughing up the teats.
Also - They once had a pregnant cow give birth in the pasture during the day, the farmer didn't know (very small scale, he doubles as a vet, and wasn't outside at the time), and the cow came back to the barn in the evening, no longer pregnant. The farmer had to go looking for the calf out in the fields.


I'm not defending this stance or arguing against it, just passing along what I was told. The impression that was given to me is that cows have a different mother-baby relationship than humans. Maybe, cows have been taken care of by humans for so many generations, that that attachment has been bred otu or something.

Interesting, not sure what to think though. I'm happy to hear everyone elses' experiences and opinions.

Aven

[AJP]

Calves can be rough on teats, but we're on our second calf with our cow now and have kept them together both times with no problems other than a few scratches from sharp calf teeth. It complicates matters in a commercial model if you're trying to maximize milk production, because the cow can tend to hold up her milk in preference for the calf (they have quite a bit of control over the let-down reflex), plus the calf can take more than they technically need, and then you get less milk and less cream (incomplete let-down means less hind-milk, where the cream is). But in a family cow situation like ours, not trying to generate any income, rather than a commercial farm, that can be worked around.

The article does come across as somewhat naive and simplistic to me. IMO, milking a cow isn't "stealing", cows as we know them would not exist without humans. They descend from wild species from many thousands of years ago, having been selectively bred by humans to suit domesticity and food production. Any dairy cow will produce way, way more milk than one calf can drink, due to that selective breeding. I have no qualms about taking the extra. And whether or not it's "natural" is a matter of opinion. Humans do lots of things other species don't, that doesn't make it unnatural.

I agree many people who eat meat or dairy just don't want to know what's really involved in producing animal foods. There are alternatives to business-as-usual, but it's not safe to assume that because a farm is small or organic or local means its practices meet with any particular set of ethics. Asking questions is fine, but be respectful and open, farming is very hard work and many farmers accept the burden of food production that average people won't face.

[Arduinna]

We also had no problems milking our cow while leaving her calf with her.

[rachelsmama]

"What do you do when a cow's milk production slows down"

Pot roast. At least that's what they did at the one dairy farm I used to visit. The cows were pastured as often as the climate permitted so it was tasty pot roast even if it wasn't super tender.

[Alyantavid]

I think most people, at least on this board, don't buy milk from places like the ones described in the article.

If people want to drink milk and eat meat, this is how it's done to keep up with demand. If you don't like it, don't buy it.

Weaning calves is traumatic for the cow and the calf. Moreso when the calf is older than when it's a day old. Yes, the cows and calves moo constantly for a few days. But what choice do the farmers have to continue their livelihood?

Not every bull calf born on a dairy goes to a veal farm. The majority of meat eaters eat more mature meat than veal. I know anti-beef/dairy industry people play up the veal aspect alot, but most of these calves are raised and sent to feedlots. Not any better, imo, but different.

Originally Posted by avendesora

I'm not defending this stance or arguing against it, just passing along what I was told. The impression that was given to me is that cows have a different mother-baby relationship than humans. Maybe, cows have been taken care of by humans for so many generations, that that attachment has been bred otu or something.

I wondered about this when we bred our cow. She is half Holstein, half Angus and was born on a dairy. I didn't know if she'd have any maternal instincts at all. But she's been a fabulous mama since the day her baby was born.

If people spend much time around cows, it's almost funny how alike they are to humans. While most of the mamas go out and eat or graze, they'll put the babies down in a group with one or two other mamas nearby. When a human gets too close to their baby, some mamas get very very upset.

The story of the calf who disappeared and the cow didn't care doesn't seem very plausible to me. Most cows will put their babies somewhere while they go out and graze. They know where their calf is and return to it. And yeah, the baby could have wandered off, but I really doubt much time went by before mama and baby were looking for each other.