….a tv report on a huge 32,000 cow dairy near Chicago.  Big Ag thinks this is great, of course, but we find it very depressing.  This is the future folks! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJRy82i8e5Q&feature=email Thanks to Gisela Volkert of Meerkatze.

Thanks to Juliet Cleave.

….just for fun.  Be sure to have your sound up. It’s been around before but, as I often say, this is my blog and I have certain privileges. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ssXJtzFOjA&feature=player_embedded

….sleep on the hood of a still warm car to stay warm.  But our cows pretty much tend to stay in their pastures no matter how cold they are.

….and how great all this moisture will be for the pastures.  But right now it is not a fun job bringing hay to cows in the far pastures.  We thought they had enough but underestimated their appetites in really cold and wet weather when they use more to stay warm. By morning, the chores seemed much less difficult in the bright sun.  Farm manager Duane Ard plows the driveway so the oil truck can get in.  The cows and the farmers both need energy. We had anywhere from a foot to just over two feet of snow in this latest storm.  Fortunately the ice missed us, but that will come with…

….here’s something on the internet that deserves to go viral.  A take-off on the Paul Harvey salute to farmers that was the hit of last year’s Super Bowl.  Watch it and laugh….(or cry). http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/e1abab3c2b/god-made-a-factory-farmer Thanks to Bill Roberts of 12 Stones Grasslands Beef for the link.

….somehow an idea I don’t think will catch on.  But a Virginia calf has been fitted with prosthetics….successfully.  Kinda.  You can be the judge. http://www.foxnews.com/health/2014/01/28/cow-hero-gets-new-prosthetic-hooves/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+foxnews%2Fhealth+%28Internal+-+Health+-+Text%29

In the post below (The true cost of a bull) I forgot to credit the link to Juliet Cleave, aka:  The flower of Cornwall! Sorry.

….this was the thermometer outside the door at our friend, Dr. Sue Beal’s home in northern Pennsylvania this morning.  Something like minus 22 but at that reading, what’s a degree or two?  And keep in mind this is actual temperature, not the new-fangled “feels like” stuff. Actually, Sue says the wind has mercifully died down….the sun is bright.  Which means her neighbor Punxutawney Phil will be seeing his shadow.  Which means still more winter to come…six more weeks!