Cows and Thunderstorms

There is a dairy farm about 3/4 of a mile away. We usually hear the cows around milking time. This evening they were particularly loud. Then we got a real door slammer of a thunderstorm. Lots of lightning, booming thunder and torrential rain. Afterwards the cows are all basically yelling MOO!! and have been for about an hour. It is loud. And I think a couple neighboring farms are chiming in further away. There was even a donkey a few minutes ago. Must have been pretty traumatic. Sounds like a gridlock traffic jam on the BQE at rush hour on Friday afternoon.

When cows get struck by lightning, the results are steak!

About tagged a black angus standing in middle of old Hwy 40 during a downpour just east of Westkan KS last night around midnight. She looked confused. I was just leaving CO so at first thinking maybe I shouldn't have swung by the dispensary. Maybe we were both confused.

Called Wallace Co sheriff office so hopefully nobody got hurt.

In a related matter: https://nyti.ms/3hBC0jk

These guys had a good reason to make a break for it:

"Bison Are On the Run After 125 Escape a Nebraska Feedlot"

https://static01.nyt.com/images/2020...y=90&auto=webp

Earlier this summer we experienced a thunderstorm near a cattle ranch. One thunderclap was far more intense than the others and caused intense mooing. Another night we saw adult cows moving at top speed to chase a coyote away. My assumptions about the placid cow lifestyle are fading.

They are still mooing. I wonder if this is the time of year when they separate the cows from their calves?

When I had cats they used to flatten themselves out like pressed duck and crawl under the appliances at the first sign of thunder.
Way smarter than us humans, all creatures know when the shit is going to hit the fan.

Jorn, Maybe pondering the connection between cattle and thunderstorms is a poet's thing. Apart from you, Emily Dickinson and Walter de la Mare come to mind.

Don't forget the great Gelett Burgess!

The Purple Cow

- Gelett Burgess

I never saw a Purple Cow,
I never hope to see one,
But I can tell you, anyhow,
I'd rather see than be one!


I'm going with the cow/calf separation anxiety.

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Originally Posted by j44ke

They are still mooing. I wonder if this is the time of year when they separate the cows from their calves?

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Modern dairy farming technique is to separate calves from cows shortly after birth: https://animalagalliance.org/separat...he-real-story/

Greg

Maybe they got into some fermenting early apples or something and are just singing. Many people don't know that cows are at heart very musical.

They need to upsize this:
https://thundershirt.com

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Originally Posted by j44ke

They are still mooing. I wonder if this is the time of year when they separate the cows from their calves?

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that will do it

I felt like such a dick when I sold off the calves.

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Originally Posted by ides1056

that will do it

I felt like such a dick when I sold off the calves.

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My wife while on her evening ride figured out that it was actually the farm with black angus cows. Beef not dairy. The calves were separated into another field out of sight but not out of mooing range. The cows at the nearby dairy could care less. We were hearing the angus mooing all the way across the valley. Country acoustics.

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Originally Posted by ides1056

that will do it

I felt like such a dick when I sold off the calves.

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Grandpa Nierman was a dairyman. My older brother and I would go pick out new holstein bull calves and give them a great life until we ate them or took them to sale barn. Probably had $4K in the bank by time I was 12 but Dad didn't make us pay for bottle milk or grain before sending to pasture. Bought a '55 Chevy my first car, coincidentally white and black (fool painted the bumpers). Moo.

Those were good days.

Anyone who thinks that cattle are stupid and don't have feelings is daft.

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Originally Posted by ides1056

Anyone who thinks that cattle are stupid and don't have feelings is daft.

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Humans say that to try to justify their horrid treatment of said animals (and much of the natural world in general).

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Originally Posted by ides1056

I felt like such a dick when I sold off the calves.

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A John McPhee piece--I believe it's Irons in the Fire--has a poignant observation about cows circling the pen long after the trucks have left with the calves.

My dad still feels like a jerk about slaughtering Bandit, the steer my brother and I adopted as a pet when we were kids.

From my ride last week, the cows (which are normally spread out in this field when I ride by) huddling together a couple of minutes before a crazy hail and monsoon like thunder storm hit.

Note that the only cows separate from the huddle are the calf who is next to Mama on their own. I am sure all you experienced folks find this oh yeah, but to a guy from NYC I found it very fascinating and quite telling on many levels. Of course you experienced folks could also say I am reading too much into it with the storm and the mom and calf etc.

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/...ba22a43d_c.jpgHuddle Up by Jon Mandel, on Flickr

When a local dairy barn burned down with the loss of 100 or so cows, there was a palpable sadness at the loss of life. You might expect a callousness from people involved in using cows as tools for food production, but there was something more familial in that sadness.

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Originally Posted by j44ke

with the loss of 100 or so cows

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More bad news for cattle:

Cattle Ship Capsizes Off Japan With Crew and 6,000 Cows

The livestock carrier, which left New Zealand for China last month, sent a distress signal as a typhoon raged in the area. One man was rescued.

https://nyti.ms/3lMzQzJ

Humans are responsible for so much unnecessary pain, death and destruction, it's a really a sad, sad thing.