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Tagged: animal

Agriculture
5:50 am
Fri September 21, 2012

Here's the short story on cow tails

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Credit Abbie Fentress Swanson/Harvest Public Media
Scott Poock, veterinarian for the University of Missouri Extension, demonstrates an alternative to cow tail docking at Foremost Dairy: trimming the switch off of a cow's tail.
Credit Abbie Fentress Swanson/Harvest Public Media
Here a cow with a docked tail stands alongside a cow with a tail whose switch has been trimmed at Foremost Dairy in Columbia, Mo. The dairy, which does not dock tails, acquired several cows with docked tails for a research project.
Credit Abbie Fentress Swanson/Harvest Public Media
The cow on the left has not yet had its tail trimmed.
Credit Abbie Fentress Swanson/Harvest Public Media
A close-up of the docked tail.
Credit Abbie Fentress Swanson/Harvest Public Media
Foremost Dairy has a herringbone style milking parlor. Milkers stand three feet below the cows during milking, which means a slim chance of being whacked with a cow tail.
Credit Abbie Fentress Swanson/Harvest Public Media
A line of Holsteins at the Foremost Dairy in Columbia, Mo. The cows' tails easily get dirty.
Credit Abbie Fentress Swanson/Harvest Public Media
The cows at Foremost Dairy use their tails to flick off flies
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Many people who haven’t stepped foot on a dairy might think milking a cow is a sort of Emersonian back-to-the land moment, where a milker bonds with his or her cow while communing with nature. Just milk her for a while and voilà: fresh, creamy milk. But the truth is, milking can be a very dirty job.

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Under the Microscope
5:57 pm
Thu August 9, 2012

Tracking an astronomical mystery

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Credit Photo courtesy of Google Earth Pro
The caiman/puma monster-shaped mound is one of two figures from the 4,000 year old preceramic site of El Paraíso, in the Chilca Valley. The other, a condor, is partly visible in the upper left. The arrow shows the mound’s alignment to the Milky Way.
Credit Photo courtesy of Robert Benfer
The El Paraíso condor lines up with this stone sculpted to resemble a condor head. Viewed from the entrance to a 4,000 year old temple at the site, the sun rises over this pillar during the equinox.
Credit Photo courtesy of Google Earth Pro
Orcas hunted off the Peruvian coast 500 meters away until recently when industrial fishing removed their prey. This orca-shaped mound dated to approximately 5000 years ago.
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For centuries people have lived and worked in a part of coastal Peru spotted with oddly shaped hills.  Most knew that the mounds were man made, but were they significant?  

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