Cows

I recently was part of a photography group that visited both Croatia and Slovenia.

One day in Slovenia, I decided not to take part in a walk to a waterfall because I wasn't comfortable on the hilly, rocky, slippery terrain. The morning outing was a bit more strenuous than I was comfortable with. I found a bench near a grassy enclosure that held five cows. There were three adult cows, and two calves. One of the cows was wearing a bell around her neck. I'm told the cow with the bell was a matriarch of the group, and that even if the animals were dispersed over a large area, the other members of the herd could locate their leader by the clanging of the bell. The bell also made it easier for the cowherd to find the herd.

So I sat on the stone bench and watched the cows. I felt the urge to write, but I couldn't call up my blog. So I decided to dictate a draft e-mail with the beginnings of this post.

Now I would guess that not too many people give a lot of thought to cows and their lives. But as I watched these five cows peacefully grazing on a comfortably warm and partly sunny day, I started wondering about what cows think about their environment. and their lives. 

I suppose that cows, not being the brightest among mammalian species, don't really think about their environment or about their future. They simply are. They do what cows have always done. They graze on grass, drink water when they need a drink, and have not a care in the world as long as their basic needs are met. 

In that sense, cows are much better off than are we humans. We worry about the future. We fret. We lose sleep. We plot and plan.

I know that most cows, the vast majority in fact, spend their lives outdoors in the sunshine eating grass. And then they are shipped off to what the British used to call the knacker man. There they are killed and chopped up into various cuts of meat. So-called beef cattle are raised and killed for their meat. Dairy cows, such as the ones I watched, are used to produce milk for human consumption until they are deemed no longer productive. Then they, too, end up as hamburger meat.

I would guess that cows don't worry about the future. They don't fear their looming deaths and dismemberment. They simply do what cows have always done. They eat, they drink, they have babies, and they have no fear of what future awaits them. 

Some 900.000 cattle are slaughtered every day around the world. That is a tremendous number of lives lost each day. Several years ago I made the decision to give up cow's milk and beef. I really enjoyed vanilla almond milk, until I had to give up anything almond due to the nuts' contribution to the development of kidney stones, for which I have been treated surgically five times. If I feel like having a burger, I enjoy a plant-based burger, which is remarkably tasty It isn't much, but giving up beef is my small contribution to lessening the suffering of animals.

So in one respect, I think cows are very lucky. They live for the day. They love their babies, but they don't fret about things over which they have no control.

We humans could take a lesson from the lowly cow.