Why do we farm?
Click on the “Good Morning Cattle” link below to watch this video.
But one of the best ones is getting to say good morning to the cattle, to interact with them and to witness their unremitting enthusiasm for grass.
Cattle are gentle and curious. I was taking video of Ginkgo, trying to capture the movements of her tongue, as she uses it to grab grass and shear it off on her bottom teeth. The rest of the herd gathered round to investigate and to say good morning.
After you enjoy watching the herd, take a closer look at the beginning of the video. The tongue flashes out to the right and the left. Rip/tear. Rip/tear. Turn up the sound — just listen! There’s heavy breathing too. The tongue resembles sandpaper, in a gooey kind of way, and enables rapid ingestion to fill that rumen. Horses use their upper and lower incisor teeth to bite several blades of grass, tearing off the grass close to the ground. But cattle don’t have upper incisor teeth, and they don’t graze so low to the ground as to hinder regrowth of the grass. They fill their rumens (second of four stomachs) and then lie down to “chew the cud” for hours.
Join me in the pasture at this video link: Good Morning Cattle!.
