A few years ago, I had the opportunity to host a tour of our dairy farm that included the livestock-handling equipment designer and autism expert, Dr. Temple Grandin. Since then, Dr. Grandin has become even more well known because of the movie that was made about her life, but in livestock circles and educational circles, she’s a celebrity. Needless to say, I was pretty nervous.
The American Meat Institute was holding meetings in Milwaukee, and the subject of animal welfare was front and center. As part of the food system, we wanted to be involved, and to show people what we were doing in animal care from a dairy perspective. So we invited a group to our farm.
Our cows eat, drink and move about whenever they like.
There were quite a few people on the tour, and Dr. Grandin kind of went off on her own. I could see her observing the cows and how they walked, and reaching out to touch the animals. It was interesting watching her. When she finally came up to me and said, “You’re a good stockman. Your cows are really content and comfortable,” it was like getting a blessing. I guess she could tell that our cows were used to people, they were relaxed, and they had been handled with a great deal of care.
Caring for our animals is the most important thing we do.
At Majestic Crossing Dairy, our cows’ comfort is our number one priority. We achieve it through setting high standards of how we work with our animals, and by holding our employees accountable to the same high standards. And though I knew that we were doing the very best by our cows, it didn’t hurt to hear it from Temple Grandin.
