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Finally, cows are hung upside down and their throats are slit. To produce milk, the mother cow must give birth to a calf. Female calves can be entered into milking production or sold as veal. Because male calves are useless to the dairy industry, they are either shot or sent to veal crates. Regardless of sex, calves are taken from their mothers almost immediately after birth. This often causes significant mental distress for the mothers and impairs the social and physical development of the calf.

Male calves who will be raised for meat undergo castration. There are several different ways this procedure can be conducted. Other methods include cutting away portions of the scrotum and destroying testicles by removal or crushing.

Also known as dehorning, disbudding is a process where the horns of young cows are removed. Horns can be burned away using caustic acid, or cut away using implements that resemble nutcrackers. The resulting open wounds invite infection and other painful complications. Because of the painful nature of the procedure, and the fact that it is not necessary—it is merely a matter of convenience for people—many countries have banned the practice. Unfortunately, many countries, including the US and Canada, continue to allow tail-docking.

The dairy industry perpetuates the suffering, exploitation, and death of dairy cows. Many are prevented from ever setting foot onto grassy fields and socializing with other animals as they would in the wild. Although it is difficult to give up milk and cheese, doing so is the number one way to prevent the ongoing abuse dairy cows suffer on factory farms. Plant-based cheeses are becoming more popular, and cellular agricultural companies are currently exploring ways to produce real milk without using any cows.

Cutting back or cutting out dairy is a great way to help mother cows and their calves. On factory farms, animals are subjected to routine mutilations and extreme confinement.

They're also genetically manipulated for the supposed benefit of human consumers. Do They Suffer? The average Holstein cow produces roughly 23, pounds of milk during each lactation period.

Holsteins can give birth at only 23 months of age. India has more dairy cows than any other country, with roughly 60 million cows. Domestic demand is likely to improve throughout the year as restaurant business picks up. Finally, beef exports showed a lot of improvement in the fourth quarter of , and this trend is likely to continue into This would still not fully compensate a cow-calf operator for the value of their labor, and would not provide any return to land, but it would be an improvement from Put simply, profit continues to be a challenge for cow-calf operations which means that efficiency and cost control will be of great importance once again.

Reducing and managing costs was one of the main focuses of the Cow-Calf Profitability Conferences that were held during the winter of Unfortunately, COVID forced us to cancel over half of the conferences we planned to deliver last year.

The good news is that we will be offering these in a virtual format this winter on the evenings of March Registration, agendas, and other information can be found at the Virtual Cow-calf Profitability Conference webpage. We hope that you will join us on those evenings as we think every cow-calf operator in Kentucky can benefit from the material being covered. Halich uky. Jonathan Shepherd is an Extension Specialist in Farm Management and can be reached at jdshepherd uky.

Greg Halich Associate Extension Professor greg. Kenny Burdine Associate Extension Professor kburdine uky. Jonathan Shepherd Extension Specialist jdshepherd uky. The U. In general, the decision for will not be nearly as important as in most years, as the likelihood for a payout with either program is fairly low with all crop-types. Author s : Greg Halich, Kenny Burdine, and Jonathan Shepherd Published: February 25th, Shareable PDF The purpose of this article is to examine cow-calf profitability for a spring calving herd that sold weaned calves in the fall of and provide an estimate of profitability for the upcoming year.

Progressive means that it gets worse over time. Most scientists think that BSE is caused by a protein called a prion. For reasons that are not completely understood, the normal prion protein changes into an abnormal prion protein that is harmful. The body of a sick cow does not even know the abnormal prion is there. A common sign of BSE in cows is incoordination.

A sick cow has trouble walking and getting up. It usually takes four to six years from the time a cow is infected with the abnormal prion to when it first shows symptoms of BSE.

This is called the incubation period. During the incubation period, there is no way to tell that a cow has BSE by looking at it. Once a cow starts to show symptoms, it gets sicker and sicker until it dies, usually within two weeks to six months. There is no treatment for BSE and no vaccine to prevent it.

Currently, there is no reliable way to test for BSE in a live cow. After a cow dies, scientists can tell if it had BSE by looking at its brain tissue under a microscope and seeing the spongy appearance. Scientists can also tell if a cow had BSE by using test kits that can detect the abnormal prion in the brain. Brain from a cow sick with BSE, as seen under a microscope using special stains.

The large white spaces are like the "holes" of a sponge. The parts of a cow that are not eaten by people are cooked, dried, and ground into a powder. The powder is then used for a variety of purposes, including as an ingredient in animal feed.