If you live in or visit a rural area you might overhear something like "We hauled the heifers from their old pasture this morning, we'll need to fence off a few acres of pasture so they don't founder on this flush of growth." Heifers? Founder? Flush? What is this person talking about? Well my friend, you have just been introduced to 'Farmerese'!
Farmers work in a unique field, one could correctly call them specialists, and just like specialists in any other field they have their own dialect. These terms are specific to the details of daily life on the farm and describe animals, machinery, landscape and procedures in terms that other farmers readily understand. For those looking in these terms can be rather bewildering, but now you have the inside scoop and can impress your friends with your new and expanded vocabulary!
We will be using and expanding an excellent list originally compiled by Our Ohio and hope to teach you some new words over the next few months so that when you hear a sentence like the one above you will know exactly what is going on! Yes, I promise these are all real words, how about we start with a couple you will hear regularly around here?
Terms frequently used for female cattle (bovines):
Cow - A cow is a female bovine that has had at least one baby, or calf. Just like other mammals, cows cannot make milk until they have had a baby, so all of the milking cows in our herd are mommas! Our cows usually have a calf every year or so with a break of several months before the new calf is born where they aren't producing any milk.
Heifer - A heifer is a female bovine that has not had a calf yet. Normally she is under two years of age.
Freemartin - A heifer who was twin to a bull (male) calf. Freemartins are almost always sterile. True story.
Tune in later for more terms from 'Farmerese'!
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