As I wrote Nosy Cow I wondered how often I had written Nosy Cow as a header. But every where I turned yesterday with a fork full of cow manure, as I cleaned and remade the cows beds, there was Lady Astor, watching, standing right in the way, not moving an inch, being suspiciously sweet and honey like.
Bless her. She is such a good girl. Even when she was trying to kill me, do you remember when she kicked me in the face with her hoof as I was cleaning her udder in the early days of training her as a milking cow. (Shakes head and sighs). Yes. Even then we knew this cow would come through.
Alex sniffs me now. It is an advance in our relationship. When she sees me she will reach out her head as long as her neck will go and I do the same and we sniff each others noses. An exchange of breath. Like a hongi but no touching. Then she stands for a few seconds of deep thought, looks disappointed and moves away.
Speaking of milking cows, we will have to adjust the stanchion to accommodate this very short cow plus a middling cow (Aunty Del) plus the mature cows (me and Lady Astor). Which makes me think of Daisy in her early days before she got sick who would walk in and just stand to be milked, no rope, no stanchion-nothing.
I came out from the barn to find the pea fowl waiting for me on the truck.
I asked them to get off so they flew over and waited on the tractor instead.
Across the other side at the West Barn I did the same kind of work but with different attendants.
I hope you have a lovely day.
Love celi
The Kitchen's Garden 
42 responses to “Nosy Cow”
I really like the chicken (rooster?) with the pantaloons. I mean, I love the cows and look forward to the new little cows, but that little chicken is just so sweet.
That beautiful little cow looks just like a teddy bear I had as a kid. A very happy weekend to you all, c. xx >
The hongi info was interesting. Now I know how you came up with Tane’s name! Always have wondered how you name your animals and birds.
I have several helpers, as well. One is curious enough that he decides to taste whatever it is that is novel – hose, bag, my boot, my leg. He’s a giver.
Today’s post made me think of something funny. I often gently ‘blow my breath’ at my neighbor’s cats and they seem very, very interested when I do this and put their head’s forward to take it in. (You know how it is said that some animals, like cats and dogs, can smell sickness. I even used to do that when we had our horse and he liked it as well. EXCEPT the time I did it after I’d drank a really strong rum & coke. His lips curled up in such disgust. He looked so funny.. and I never did that again. ; o )
Hahaha… that’s funny! We can learn from that… 🙂
I do that with my horse, in return she blows softly, gently up and down my cheek. It always makes me feel so peaceful.
I love that your horse blows gently up and down your cheek – isn’t it wonderful when we feel the connection with other members of the animal species who just don’t happen to be human!! ; o )
Eleven days!!! You must be chafing at the bit! Good thing you have your farmy routines to focus on. Sorry your California stop will be so far away from me. I was hoping against hope that it might be the Sacramento airport where you changed planes, but LAX is much more understandably cosmopolitan. I was hoping for a glimpse, hearing a bit of your voice and, if you’d hold still for a quick minute, a h*g. All I have to say is rats! Much disappointed love, Gayle, sighing…
Those pea fowls are characters aren’t the? Enjoy your day too Celi 😀
I would love to hear someday what you do with your cows’ milk (ie, pasteurizing or not, speeding the cooling process or not, etc). Assuming you haven’t written about it already, which you probably have! I was just reading a bit about it yesterday and then spent a lot of last night thinking about what I’d have to do if I some day, hypothetically got a dairy cow (very helpful use of sleeping time, thanks brain). I’ve got little kids to think about, and I’m not entirely comfortable letting them drink raw milk.
No I don’t pasteurise, we drink it raw, raw butter, icecream, cheese, etc. But I would only drink raw milk from my own cow, then I know exactly her health and the way the milk has been handled.