Drink Milk be Healthy, the Magic of Milk

From time immemorial, cows have been a part of civilized life. Remains of domesticated cattle dating to 6500 BC have been found in Turkey and other sites in the Near East. All the cattle we see today have a single ancestor, the Aurochs. The Aurochs was the great, black bull that was painted on cave walls alongside bison and mammoths by prehistoric cavemen. It is believed a poacher killed the last surviving member of the species in 1627, on a hunting reserve near Warsaw, Poland.

There are more than 787 breeds of cattle and 72 breeds of buffaloes in the world. India has 30 & 10 distinctive breeds of cattle and buffaloes respectively. The characteristic hump, long ears and bushy tail distinguish the Indian cow from the others. World over, cows dominate milk production but in India, the buffaloes are the major contributor to the total milk production. India has the world's largest (53%) buffalo population. 44% of milk animals in India are buffaloes and they contribute over 50% to the India's milk production. India has over 5.4 crore breedable cows and 4.2 crore breedable buffaloes (1998-99 cattle census) - that's about one cow or buffalo for every ten of us! Cows eat grass, chopped corn, bajra, lucerne, berseem, hay and silage, cattle feed and drink plenty of water.

While the cows and buffaloes give us milk, the bullocks help the farmer in ploughing the field. Cow dung has been used as an effective cleanser and sanctifier in India, from time immemorial. Cow dung coated floors are effective in keeping the house free of all kinds of vermin. Dried cakes of cow dung are still used as a substitute for firewood in cooking.

Chances are, every time you see a cow, its chewing food… Cows are ruminants i.e. they are cud-chewing mammals. Cud is regurgitated, partially digested food and a cow can comfortably chew cud for up to 8 hours each day.

Cows have an extraordinary stomach. It has four compartments. The first, Rumen, holds large quantity of cud. Rumen cud contains microflora, which are useful for feed and fodder digestion. The second, Reticulum or the hardware stomach, is where accidental food, like a piece of fencing scrap, lodges; the third, Omasum, works as a filter of sorts and the fourth, the Abomasum, is like our stomach. Cows drink about 75 litres of water and eat around 20-25 kilos of green fodder a day apart from concentrates like balanced cattle feed and dry fodder depending upon the body weight and the quantity of milk she gives.

Like humans, cows have 32 teeth but they don't have the top front incisors. They have a tough pad of skin, called the dental pad and 8 incisors on the bottom front. The cow grabs a tuft of grass with the skin pad and bottom incisors and it's sent down the Rumen where it lodges as cud. When the Rumen is full, the cow regurgitates the cud and uses the 6 pre-molars and molars on the top and bottom of each side to chew cud, for all it's worth.