Milk Replacer Anonymous

Remember Daisy? My Chore-Calf?  You can read about Daisy HERE.

 

Well, she’s gone. The cow pen is empty and the milk bucket sits neglected. 

 

What happened to her?  She has left us to join the neighbor’s herd of Herefords. 

 

Cows are social herders—they don’t like to be alone, and Daisy is no fool.  She learned long ago how to get through a barbed wire fence. Rather, how and where to go under the fence. Since she is still relatively small, she can still do this.  A full sized cow probably couldn’t get under our fence anywhere.  She doesn’t like to be by herself, so she’d go out during the day and join the Herefords, then come back in the evening.

 

Used to be, Daisy would maybe take an occasional day trip and graze with the neighbor’s herd during the day, and then come back to our yard at night, mooing loudly for her milk-fix.  She was like an alcoholic bellying up to the bar for her nightly libation. She’d come right up to the fence and loudly bellow until her drink was served.  Mmmmmm…. Milk replacer powder mixed with warm water…. Wonder when we will see that on the specialty drink menu anywhere?  That’s Daisy’s drink of choice.  Personally, I like a good glass of red wine, but to each her own.

 

Daisy then spread her return trips out to every-other-evening.  I don’t know if she was consciously alternating days for her returns, but she was.  After a week or two of every-other-night, she stopped coming back altogether.  We haven’t fed her any milk replacer for a few weeks now.  I guess she weaned herself. And, she’s perfectly content to spend her time with her new friends, the Herefords.  We drive by her with her new pals every day, smiling and waving, and she’ll have nothing to do with us.  I guess she’s decided if we’re not going to be her bartender anymore, we’re useless to her.

 

When I came across this cartoon from a friend of mine, I immediately thought of Daisy. 

I imagine Daisy not carrying a milk truck but painting her face and underside white if she had the chance.  Meanwhile, the Herefords are saying, “Go Home, Daisy!”   Although, to take my metaphor further, it would actually be somewhat the opposite.  In Daisy’s case, the Herefords were her “AA” group or, “Milk Replacer Anonymous,” and now she’s gone through her twelve steps and she doesn’t need us anymore. In any event, she hasn’t gone too far. We can still keep an eye on her and go get her when we need to.  And, she looks good.  Must have been time to quit anyway.

 

Now, to open that bottle of wine!