Why Mattie Loves Steve more than me....

I am trying hard not to take Mattie's preference for Steve personally. She is my cow, or so I thought. I carefully saved up my extra grocery money (money saved from growing things in the garden) and then researched exactly what kind of cow I wanted.

Lots of time on the internet, and on my farmer/biodynamic lists made me know that I wanted an A2 cow, as opposed to an A1 cow. Milk from A2 cows is far less prone to cause milk allergies in folks (and people in my family are proned to allergies). I wanted a heritage breed with a sweet temperament. I wanted a cow that had been handled and loved and didn't need taming. I wanted a big cow that gave a lot of milk. I wanted a cow that I could fall in love with. And I wanted a cow that would fall in love with me too.

Mattie is a former 4-H cow, who follows without a lead rope (at least for some people--like Steve) and is sweet as can be. She's a full-blood Guernsey so she gives LOTS of extra nutritious milk. (Guernsey milk has more vitamin A than other milk, so much so it is even tinted a bit yellow!) Guernsey's used to be common but are now rare (filling my heritage breed desire) and are almost always A2. So it seems I got almost everything I wanted in Mattie but the problem is that Mattie LOVES Steve. Honestly, this isn't much of a problem if she would only love me too. But she clearly prefers Steve. She much prefers when Steve milks her, feeds her and handles her. I am so the hired help.

I mean take milking for an example. For me, she stomps and kicks and gives a little bit of milk. For Steve, she might kick a bit to start but then settles right down and gives a LOT of milk (unless I walk in the barn and she starts kicking again.) She lets Steve handle her and is much more fussy towards me. She likes me well enough from the other side of the stall door giving her hay but the second I walk into the stall she much prefers Steve. Two people commenting on her interactions with the lot of us have suggested that she's jealous of me and wants Steve all to herself. Sorry girl, I got him first.

I got to thinking about it though and maybe it makes sense that she likes Steve better. Mattie was raised from a calf by a teenage boy who wanted her to be the best 4-H cow he ever had. His brother just had a cow go all the way to the National cow fair in Madison, Wisconsin. Mattie was related to this cow, so he had reason for his high hopes for her.

All her life before she came to us, Mattie was loved, and fed and brushed and trained by a boy who wanted her to be the most beautiful cow at the fair. And you KNOW how devoted a teenage boy can be to the one he loves. Everyday, he worked with her, talked to her, cared for her. And his mom Vicki (the woman I bought Mattie from) cared for her other cows in the background. Then the boy went away to college and left Mattie behind. Mom took over her care. She was kind but she was busy and she wasn't Mattie's boy.

Then suddenly Mattie and her little calf Moose are on a truck being away hauled to a new place without all the cows she had lived her whole life with. So now she's lost her home, her friends AND her boy. Life kind of sucks, even if the new folks are nice.

She gets out of the trailer and meets me. But unfortunately, ever so human things have caused the boy's mom to be hours late delivering Mattie and suddenly everything is a rush. This meant I didn't have the first few hours to properly welcome her and help her settle in. Instead, we lead her in the barnyard with Brigid and Gilly and then we all rush away. By the time I came back she looked a little dazed. New place, no friends and the new cows had horns.

Mattie didn't like that. In fact, she refused to eat (Guernsey's are like that.) And so we had to give her her own pasture and she isn't part of a herd. Cows love to be with their friends.

It took us a couple of weeks to figure out the best arrangement for all of this. So each day, Mattie and I negociated change after change while Steve was the steady one who came each night late and gave her an extra flake of hay and a nice scratch on the head. No wonder she likes him better. On some level, he has to remind her of her devoted boy.

So when it came down to milking and you were Mattie, who would you choose for your favorite? Good ole' reliable late night treat man, or wacky change woman who can't make up her mind about which place you get to live or what is the best way to feed you. The answer is pretty obvious, pick good ole' reliable treat man. And that is how this is sorting out (at least for the time being). Steve comes late at night, brings treats and milks her and I do the middle of the day stuff.

I suspect she feels like I am the cleaning lady and Steve is the crown prince. I am not sure who she thinks Aidan is, the morning stable boy? Oh well, at least we all know our places. And Mattie is surely the princess in all this. One thing I know for sure, there's no way for her to be queen, Brigid has that role more than filled.

Why I own a cow (or 4)

Owning a cow is kind of a big deal. Well, I guess not even kind of. It is a big deal.

To begin with cows are just plain big. If you live somewhere like I do where you have to feed them 9 or 10 months of the year, they can be expensive. If you aren't careful they step on your feet when you are trying to move them around (my foot still hurts from the last time one did 6 weeks ago) and well, they aren't like a dog that comes in out of the rain and lays by your feet and snuggles. They need a covered space in bad weather. And they make a lot of poop that has to be dealt with.

Granted, a fresh cow will give you delicious fresh milk but you have to milk her and that my friends, while relaxing in many ways, is no small endeavor. You have to be home at the same time everyday. You have to separate them from their baby (which neither mom nor baby enjoy) and you have to milk them.

To milk them, if they are a full sized cow like Mattie, you have to get over your fear of how big they are and how small you are in comparison. Because one thing is for sure, if the cow figures out that you don't think you are boss she will do her darndest to make sure she is boss. And boss cows aren't particularly nice.

So why, given all this, was I so determined to have a cow? I had two reasons--one I used to buy raw milk from my cheesemaking neighbor down the road and got positively hooked on the wonderful feeling my body had when I drank REAL milk. Julie's cheese went big and she stopped selling milk. I tried buying raw milk in the store but it just wasn't the same. There is something about one cow and her milk. It is just different than drinking milk all mixed together from a dairy full of cows. Funny as this sounds, having a relationship with the cow seems to enhance the relationship of the milk with my body. One of those things we just don't think about any more in our ever so modern world. It seems like every step of modernization gives us things and but also takes things away. In the case of dairies, we have a LOT more milk than we used to but the quality has gone way down.

My other reason was I am a compost nut and every good gardener knows that compost goes better with manure, esp cow manure. Brigid gave us some nice manure, esp if we were willing to trot about the pastures picking it up. But Mattie, Mattie's my girl because she happily donates massive amounts right there in the stall and all we have to do is scoop it up and make compost. Since she's been here we have made one gigantic compost pile and sheet mulched 3 good sized areas for new garden beds. And that is just in six weeks. Think how much compost she is going to help us make when she's been here a year. I can't wait.

But in the meantime, I am going to take her delicious milk and turn it into homemade kefir and make myself a delicious breakfast smoothie. Here's how....

First get a quart jar and put the kefir grains in them...if anyone wants to try this and doesn't have access to kefir grains let me know, I can grow some extras and send them to you.

You need about a tablespoon of kefir grains per quart of milk, but they keep reproducing so sometimes you will have more and the kefir will make itself faster. Once you have a couple tablespoons, divide the grains in half and share with a friend. These grains (in the picture) are about ready to divide. And while they may look gross, these funny little grains voraciously eat the sugars in the milk and form a powerpacked delicious way to build your intestinal flora and add calcium to your diet. If you have only tried keifr from the store don't be so sure that you know what it is like. Homegrown kefir out of fresh raw milk is an entirely different taste than anything I have ever bought. No matter how good the store kefir package made it sound, raw homemade is better.

Once the kefir grains are in the jar, add a quart of milk and cover with a good fitting lid. Place in a warm spot and leave be for 24-48 hours (depending on how warm it is and how many kefir grains there are). When you walk by give the jar a gentle stir and watch how the milk gradually thickens and turns into kefir as the time goes by. Once the kefir sets up, remove the grains by running the kefir through a strainer and start the process over. Put the fresh made kefir in the fridge until you are ready to use it. If you leave the grains in too long, the kefir grains get hungry and start making the kefir taste too sour. (It is kind of sour to begin with so too sour is not good. You can eat it, but it won't be as yummy.)

To make a breakfast smoothie, here's what I do.

Into a blender or cuissinart I put:

1 c. fresh kefir

1 t. honey (for its superfood qualities)

1 cup homegrown frozen fruit (my favorite is peach or strawberry)

1 raw egg from my chickens (I know some people would leave this out, that's ok. It is good either way)

1 T. fresh cream (thank you Mattie)--I do this for a health reason (long story)

Then for extra nutritional gumption I add:

1 T. maca powder (another superfood, this time from South America)

1 T. fish oil (this is the only way I can get this stuff down)

2 T. noni (another superfood)

1 T. aloe vera juice (another superfood)

and then I add any other supplements I might be taking that come in powdered or bad tasting forms, for example I might add cal/mag powder and/or extra probiotics, even though fresh kefir is super high in them, I know they are good for some stuff I have going on so I throw them in as an extra precaution.

Occassionally, I add some acai which is another South American superfood.

Then I blend this all together for a long time--2-3 minutes. I blend it so long because the smoothie gets super creamy and tastes almost like ice cream and we all know how much I like ice cream. I put it in my car cup and drink as slowly as possible (sometimes it tastes so good I gulp it down). Yum! And the best thing about these smoothies is how flexible they are..if you like bananas--add one. Hate fish oil, leave it out. It's up to you and no matter what it is probably going to taste really, really good. If you try it, let me know how you like it.

And I was serious about the offer for kefir grains. They are easy to mail around.