So a dairy farm’s purpose is to produce milk, right? And milk comes from female cows, right? So you might be wondering what we do with bulls that are born on our farm.

There’s a lot of controversy about cows giving “consent” to be bred. I don’t know about you, but last I knew, cattle can’t speak English. So their way of giving “consent” is to provide nonverbal cues to show when they want to be bred.

No longer are the days of sitting on a stool with a bucket and milking each cow by hand. The milk parlor has optimized the milking process; making it more efficient and a vital tool in keeping up with the dairy demands of the world.

Taking calves away from their mama cow is a common practice on dairy farms. Why do we do this?

I get a lot of questions about what we feed our cows. The answer to that question is a Total Mixed Ration (TMR). A TMR is a combination of feed ingredients to make up a balanced meal to feed the cows. A TMR helps a dairy cow achieve maximum performance and health.

So I heard Epicurious isn’t going to post beef recipes anymore. I think that’s crap. So I did my own recipe round up. Join me in enjoying these 10 beef recipes from farmers and ranchers themselves.

There are people who wake up and see the world through a realistic lens, who trust scientists and their years of experience, who trust animal welfare experts like the renowned scientist Temple Grandin, and then there are people who wake up every day like Allstate’s Mayhem Commercial Guy and are ready to pounce upon the world like the F1 offspring of a category 7 hurricane and F5 tornado.

As a fourth generation dairy farmer who has dedicated my career - and therefore life - to raising and caring for dairy cattle and ensuring high-quality, reasonably priced, delicious dairy products are available in grocery stores, the thought of defending an industry that shows generation after generation we can become more-sustainable while continually improving how we care for our farm animals is exhausting.

Let’s put the misconception that cows are causing climate change to rest. Dairy farmers are producing four times as much milk with almost one third the number of cows.

Dairy cows are not the same as beef cows. They should not and do not look alike. They are bred, and therefore built, differently and for their own specific purposes.

It’s important to understand cattle vaccines and why we choose to vaccinate our dairy cows. Ultimately, we want to make our cows’ lives better, safer and healthier.

Do you have kids? Ya know how one day they’ll eat their whole plate of food and the next day they won’t even touch their toast? If you think kids are unpredictable, try caring for livestock.

One day you’re getting along just fine and the next day a storm rolls in; adding challenges like the riving rising and pastures flooding.

In short, just like we cut our toenails, cows’ hooves are consistently growing and need trimmed. Basically, it’s good hygiene. We have the cows’ hooves trimmed on a regular basis to maintain welfare and to prevent lameness.

Dairy farmers are terrible and lock their cattle indoors for no reason. Right? Well, not so much.

Then why do we keep them in barns where we can control and monitor their comfort levels, ensure their nutrient-dense rations are dry and that they have access to water, brushes and clean bedding?

Because we take animal care seriously. It’d be easy to say because it’s our job and that’s why, but for us, and many farming families, it’s more than that.

As humans, it’s easy to assume what cows should or shouldn’t like based on our personal comfort preferences and impose our believes on them. I, personally, don’t like sleeping in the dirt or in mud, and if I’d never stepped foot on a dairy farm it would be easy for me to assume that cows wouldn’t like that either.

Sunrise over a coastal dairy farm.

Wilsonview Dairy is a proud member of the Tillamook County Creamery Association and has been since the farm’s inception in 1912. TCCA is a farmer-owned co-op, which was formed three years before our farm when several small creameries contributed $10 each, and is headquartered in Tillamook, Oregon.