Valokuva: Pia Simonen

"It doesn't help, say cattle"

Photo: Pia Simonen

The decades of the cow from the traditional 60s to the techno era of 2000.


"I am a cow from the 60s. I am walking in the forest pasture. Wonderful silence, what a family of cows is now learning to dive in the bay with their hooves. In the forest we move as a herd, all six cows. At night we retreat to the end of the barn to ruminate on a dry shoe*. The sun rises, the door of the house opens and the mistress walks in to milk. We are so peaceful, we are not being caught. The buckets and sieves are already in the pile. The milking cloths are in warm water, the command is given: "Get up, I will milk you". I get up willingly, already forcing the teats. The mistress directs me towards her with a stool and a rainta*. She sits on my right side and cleans me. I pour my milk and there is a tsii, tsii, tsii as the first sprays slide into the bucket [...] The mistress takes the milk to cool in the bucket, from where it is taken to the roadside pier to the milk truck.

Then the landlady guides us to the field pasture. The grass is tasty, after all, dry hay has already been gathered from this area for the winter. After a few hours, we, the cows and the herd of calves are guided back to the forest pasture, where we can go to the shore to drink. It is already evening milking time. The landlady makes a smoke*, which makes the worst flies and flies fly away. Ticks from the shore bat stuck to the back of the udder. Yes, they suck blood, they hang like a roller. My daughter drops the tick rollers, plucking them.


Autumn is coming and we will move into a full barn*. It is soft and good to be in there even in the coldest weather. Straw underneath and log walls.“


" I'm a cow from the 70s . I feel like people are already talking a bit, we should increase the number of cows, otherwise we won't be able to manage. Milking machines have become more common, bucket-type, four-armed, which pull all the teats at once. At first, I had to kick a bit, as the sound of the machine was scary and the jugs rattled like they were on an evacuation route. Luckily, the owner takes the machine off when the milk runs out.
They bred me from the best cows of previous generations, I'm a bit of a cross between an East Finn and an Ayshire. I have horns, like an old maid with tits in case I get sick. They don't lead me to the neighbor's Jahvet, as was the custom a decade ago. We even walked to the neighbor's bull in the snow and heard the owner ask how much it makes. Now they call a seminologist who comes with a whistle and that's usually what makes a calf grow in the stomach. There was even an occasional entrepreneur who would transport the bull by car, but he wasn't invited to us.

" I am a cow from the 80s . My weight has increased dramatically as my diet has changed to match production. Thanks to the advice and the livestock observers. The conditions in the barn are terrible, the udder is 15 cm too short for me, fortunately there are grates on the troughs and they have bought udder vests. They shave the excess hair with a shearing machine in the autumn, no sweat and by the time it gets cold, enough new hair has grown. They have developed a farm tank and a tube milking machine. You can see the milk flowing through the pipes into the farm tank, and I can't kick the jugs over. Two units are milking at the same time."

" I am a cow from the 90s . Living conditions are improving. Knowledge increases with training, beliefs decrease. Milking units increase, as do cows in barns. The nurse has no time to hurry and clean my udders. She puts 5 machines to milk and continues to clean the next ones. The detachers do the rest. The neighbor's cows have already moved to a new yard. They walk around there loose, occasionally daring to eat each other's rations."

" I am a 21st century cow . The computer shows the truth, who milks what every day, and also knows how to figure out what is eaten on the screen. The EU dictates what and how the household can do. This does not suit all owners, the barn is emptied. For others, it is a challenge: I can do it, I can do it and I will succeed, I bought a milking robot and I am progressive. Our ancestors did it, the obstacles are challenges and for overcoming. Long live Finnish dairy production."

[All excerpts from the competition text: The Decades of the Cow from the Traditional 60s to the Techno Age of 2000 ; text shortened ]

Glossary*
shoe = the highest point in the barnyard
rainta = milking pail
smoke = campfire in the barnyard
to kick = to kick
vat siihe or vat sienoo = be in your place
Full barn = manure is leveled under the animals and straw is placed on top
in good condition = in good condition
rent = bull's rent
partiskka = animal broker for livelihood
rush = open the door quickly

Background to the text

It was 2019 and summer vacation. I was sitting in the archives of the Finnish Literature Society and wading through the materials for the "It doesn't help, say the cow" writing competition. The competition, organized by the Rural Education Association , the Folk Poetry Archive and the Finnish Literature Society in 2004, was looking for memories of everyday life with cows. Almost 3,000 entries were submitted to the competition, more than for any other topic up to that point.

Unlike many other collecting competitions, this competition also allowed you to submit fiction. Several authors used this freedom of writing to immerse yourself in the life of a cow. I was deeply touched by these attempts to see the world through the eyes of a cow. Regardless of whether things are this way or that, they bring out a new perspective and aspects of everyday cattle production that would otherwise be overlooked. In the selected text above, cows from different decades tell about their experiences. The author amuses himself with the older vocabulary of barn language. Did you know the meaning of all the words marked *?

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