“Dairy cows, are like ferraris” – Prof. Vern Osborne, Animal and Poultry Science

If you’ve ever enjoyed yogurt, cream, cheese, cream cheese, ice cream or a simple glass of milk, you can thank a dairy cow.

Weighing around one ton, the dairy cow must pump 1000 litres of blood that travels around her udder to produce 1 litre of milk for us! In a day, the average cow can produce 30 litres of delicious & nutritious milk.

In order to ensure a cow’s productivity, reproduction and health, farmers use Body Condition Scoring to measure the amount of subcutaneous fat (fat found under the skin) in a cow.

Using a 5-point scoring system, farmers look at the hooks, pins, thurls and ribs of the cow to determine her score. A score of 1 would denote an extremely thin cow, while a score of 5 tells the farmer his cow is excessively fat. Most dairy cows fall in between 2.5 and 4. The hardest part about body condition scoring is narrowing down what quarter point to give a cow (Is she a 3.25 or a 3.5?)

Once we reached the barn, everyone chose a cow to score!

We also got to witness feeding time, one cow even gave Andrea a friendly lick!

After students completed scoring their cow, our dairy expert, Vern, let students know if their scoring was accurate. Everyone’s numbers were on-point!

For their outstanding efforts, students received honorary dairy expert hats.

This spring, the University of Guelph opened a new, state-of-the-art dairy research facility in Elora that houses over 600 cows. To learn more, visit the Livestock Research and Innovation Centre’s blog and twitter!

https://eloradairyfacility.wordpress.com/
https://twitter.com/milk1elora?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

Earlier this year, my brother Alex decided to bring back the tradition of gardening at our house. (My nonno, an Italian immigrant used to have a garden here, too).  This project got me interested in what exactly went into tending a garden, so I decided to find & help out.

Because of this garden, we have been able to harvest: carrots, cherry tomatoes, onions, zucchini, green beans, snow peas, spinach, lettuce, kale, radish and cucumbers!! ***I am planning on making kale chips for the class at some point**

He taught me about pruning — a vital part of maintaining a healthy garden so that the plant can “focus its energy on fruiting” instead of excess leaves.

The garden itself is a square foot garden, meaning it does not allow room to step in between rows of plants. Instead, he built trellises in order to let plants grow upward. This apparently can triple the amount of garden space!

Unfortunately, the big beef tomatoes did not turn out well. We’re not sure why.

Animals can pose a threat to your garden as well. That’s why catnip is a good way to draw your cat to the garden (leaving its scent, urine and fur around) to ward off unwanted visitors like rabbits.

Soon, we are going to gather dried/brown matter (leaves, and some of our ornamental long grass) and mix it with grass clippings. This mixture will be kept for a few months to a year (with regular checking) and become compost!

Growing your own garden has many benefits, from the economical to the spiritual, as it provides the satisfaction of eating food you put your own work into. I had no idea so many variables went into creating a garden and can now say I have a better understanding & appreciation for this type of work.

This work was developed in response to the 1990 “Oka Crisis,” or Kanien’kehaka resistance, when the Canadian army violently suppressed a small Mohawk Nation trying to defend its ceremonial and burial grounds from becoming a golf course. It was first used in 1991 in a meadow in Banff National Park where people’s voices, spoken through the megaphone, would echo back nine times. In 1992, Belmore toured the work across Canada to a number of sites where Indigenous land claims were being asserted and justice was being demanded.

Here is a short video that features some of her work, Speaking to Their Mother can be seen at 2:13: http://https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1z9YP3cPqJ4

http://www.jmbgallery.ca/eventsKWE.html