Have you seen a cow in real life?

[Julie's Haircut]

I never saw a Purple Cow
I never hope to see one
But I can tell you anyhow
I'd rather see than be one.

I learned that poem in something like the 2nd grade and haven't heard it in over 40 years.

Yes, I "moo" when I pass cows in a field or see them at the state fair.

 

[maslex]

Yes, I've seen many a cow in my life. But I can say one thing. We are on a 3-week road trip and drove through Oklahoma today. HOLY COW (literally and figuratively) LOL I have NEVER IN MY LIFE seen so many cows EVER than I have today. Every field we drove by must have had a bazillion cows. (give or take a few lol)

 

[manning]

That poor 9 yr old city girl we teased. we asked her where the milk comes from on the cow. Of course she says the back. Well we say it comes from the udder end. She would say the rear of the cow and we said the udder end. Had to finally let her in on the joke.

 

[Westcoastwild]

Seems kind of odd that anyone NEVER has. I live in the suburbs, but nearby there's a small educational farm with cattle. We're allowed to feed them lettuce and celery, and they absolutely love it. There's also a regional park with cattle grazing via grazing permits. I've gone hiking there and the cattle don't really seem to care. I have heard about one regional park in the San Francisco Bay Area where the cattle are more belligerent, go so far as to chase away hikers. We definitely have small scale cattle ranches in pretty much every county (except San Francisco) and many are visible from major roads. One of the more interesting areas is Point Reyes National Seashore, where the National Park Service leases out the land to cattle/dairy ranches. It's kind of complicated how that came to being, but they're still there. And of course at a county fair. Livestock exhibitions are supposed to be the backbone of most county fairs. Some of them are extremely pampered too. Then they get sold for meat.

If not from North America, I could definitely understand it if a kid or teen had not seen a cow. Have been in Japan for a month, and you don't see them even when the train is in the countryside. No sheep either. Lots of evil deer though.

My close encounters with cows have mostly been at the county fair, so I suppose if you lived on the east coast seaboard in a major city, no county fairs, you may not have seen a cow up close either.

 

[hereyago]

Yes. My grandparents had a couple. When my parents lived abroad, we saw their version of running with the bulls.

There is a petting zoo in the next city that I, dd18 And now dgd (almost 2) will grow up going to.

A dairy farmer sold his land , parcels at first in our city. The mall was built and the farm was next door, there was even underground tunnel the cows used when the major road cane...

 

[low-key]

moo

 

[ols386]

Of course, I've seen many a cow during my lifetime.

 

[ZephyrHawk]

I have.

In college my dorm room was across the hall from a girl who grew up in the city. She went with a friend of mine to visit his parents' farm. On the way, she saw some animals in a field and asked what they were. Confused, he told her they were cows, of course. She refused to believe him at first, because they were brown. She had grown up believing all cows were black and white.

 

[adisneyaunt]

Yes..as a kid, on a farm trip. As an adult... during road trips. We just had this topic yesterday at dinner.. prompted of course by the article. my DS reminded me he got to help out with a cow at a summer camp he went too. I forgot about that and figured he'd only seen them on a road trip as well. We didn't live near farms.

 

[willowsnn3]

Have seen many, many cows. Not so much now as I don't get to the rural areas as much. See the Chic fi la cow quite often tho.
Also used to live in Coweta County (pronounced Cow-eat-ah). The big question there was "have you ever seen a Coweta Cow", lol.

 

[Kellykins1218]

Well, I live in Ohio so that's a yes. I expect to see several today, too, since we are off to the county fair.

 

[Lilacs4Me]

DH lived in what I guess would be called the "inner city" of Chicago, although it wasn't really as bad as that back in the 70's, but regardless, his single mother was busy trying to raise and feed 5 boys on her own. Thry didn't travel, they didn't drive down interstates in the midwest, and they didn't have money for the zoo. His school field trips happened to be to the planetarium, or the Field Museum, or the MSI instead of out into the suburban Brookfield Zoo (not positive about the Lincoln Park Zoo, or if they happened to have had a cow there back then). So, DH didn't see a live cow growing up. How is that so hard to believe?

Ironically, when his step (now adopted) dad got into the picture and worked hard to get his family out of the city, he moved them to a small town in MI right down the road from a horse farm where there were all kinds of animals. DH was 13.

I met him when I was 14, he was 16, and guess what was behind my house? A cow farm. The cows used to come right up to our fence. However, before moving to that house, I grew up in Detroit, although more in the suburb-type area of it, but the first time I saw a live cow was my 1st grade field trip to the Detroit Zoo.

Many years later, DD drew a picture for her kindergarten teacher with the title "What I Am Thankful For". Her answer was "the bulls in my grandma's backyard" lol, and she drew a great little picture of the cows. So cute. But it totally shows how different the experiences of kids are, depending on where they live and what they are exposed to on a daily basis.

 

[fauna74]

My grandparents had a small dairy farm in northeastern Pennsylvania, so I definitely saw a cow.
However, my 30 lb jack russell/pointer mix is black and white with "cow like" markings and MANY toddlers/preschoolers have asked if she's a cow, or part cow, or just mooed when they saw her! I guess if you've only seen illustrations of cows in books.....

 

[Funfire240]

I have seen them as long as I can remember. I grew up in Toledo but we would travel each weekend to the cottage in Michigan and passed many cows. Now I live in the country. When I first moved in with DH I went for a bike ride and was so excited that I basically had cows in my backyard lol. When the kids were in daycare (and we had since moved from that house), we still drove by that farm every morning and evening and they loved mooing to them (and still yell cows! when we go that way!)

 

[WebmasterKathy]

Cows and longhorns, every day!

 

[because]

The joke in the United States is that when a kid sees a cow from a car window the appropriate thing to do is open the window and yell out MOO!

Never heard of this in my neck of the woods. As a previous poster said, must be regional or even maybe just within your social group.

As for seeing a cow, yes.

 

[DaisyJ]

Never heard of this in my neck of the woods. As a previous poster said, must be regional or even maybe just within your social group.

As for seeing a cow, yes.

Yeah, me, either. We'd spend the entire car ride with the window down, yelling out.

 

[ford family]

What about the cow that won a Nobel Prize?

It was out standing in its field.

ford family

 

[bcla]

I learned that poem in something like the 2nd grade and haven't heard it in over 40 years.

Yes, I "moo" when I pass cows in a field or see them at the state fair.

I guess it's one of the things you either have heard of or haven't, but I'm pretty sure it's something that happens anywhere in the US where there are cows. Another one is when kids are in the back seat of the car and come across a semi driver, one might do a yanking motion simulating pulling on the air horn chain. I've seen a response to that too.

 

[bcla]

These people unfortunately did.

http://www.sfgate.com/news/bayarea/...er-Car-Strikes-Cow-On-Highway-24-11727349.php

Three people were hospitalized after a car struck a cow and then was hit by another vehicle on eastbound state Highway 24 in Orinda early this morning, according to the California Highway Patrol.

The crash was reported at 12:17 a.m. on eastbound Highway 24 between Fish Ranch and Wilder roads, CHP Officer Brandon Correia said.

The cow was killed upon impact and the three people in the two cars involved in the crash were taken to John Muir Medical Center in Walnut Creek with minor injuries such as cuts, abrasions and complaints of pain, Correia said.​