Has anyone ever sheared one? Just wondering how easy the fleece is to spin? Do the calves give a softer one, bit like lamb’s wool?
Also, if you have done, how easy is it to shear a large animal with massive horns and do you have a picture of one naked?
Can’t be that hard, I believe people use yak wool for things.
Yes, but the non-eating cows don’t have much wool. (I think dairy cows may be the technical term…)
Sheep have a lot of wool but that doesn’t stop people eating them as well as shearing them.
Does the fact that Highland Cow wool is brown make it harder to dye and so less desirable?
…how would you tip the **** on its back and get its head between your legs?
Having been up close a personal to one of these while she dropped a calf, holding onto the horns required all the strength I and the farmers wife had…having those horns between your legs would rapidly lead to a new a*se hole being torn….
Highland cows are just the coolest creatures, This is Kai of Skinford (vastly shortened pedigree name) who we’ve had to hand rear as his mother refused to let him near her teats within the first hr of birth which is more often than not fatal as they need the colostrum produced by the mother to colonise their digestive tract with Antibodies, it is super high quality first milk produced by the mother prior to giving birth, very high in protein and growth hormones that seeds the initially porous stomach and gives protection from disease and infection.
This poor lad was refused access to the teats and the mother would not let us any where near her to try and milk her teats manually, she has horns of over a 6ft span that are far too large to get in the cattle crush so we had to hand rear him, he follows us around the farm and estate like one of the dogs. This pic was taken back in May – he’s considerably larger now and weighs a good few hundred KG which can be alarming when you whistle on him and wait for the rumble to appear over the hill as he barrels towards you before siding to a halt with his tongue flopping around like a big daft puppy.
Even though he is very tame you cannot 100% trust him so you have to be careful as he’s obviously not aware of his size or the consequence of his head butts which knock you off your feet, he does like a good brushing/scratching with a wire glossing brush and if you stop too soon he’ll greet like a baby.
It’s still quite cool to take the bull for a walk up the road though 😀
Startling resemblance, fortunately mine has grown to a few kg rather than a few hundred. I now have to hide this thread otherwise my wife will be trying to persuade me to let her have a highland calf in the garden.
Been doing research. Turns out you pluck Yaks rather than shear them
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[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SxwUIsRqohQ[/video]
Not so sure this would work with heilan’ coos though. The yak seems remarkably patient.
Heilan coos can be vicious BTW. You can give most coos a shove or pat on the head (!!) but a Heilan coo is another thing altogether. I’ve seen guys trying to put their hands on the coos head only to have them swiped away by those horns long before they get their hand near them. I’ve helped out on a pals farms many a time and we all give them a wide berth….very very tasty though!
Re the yak video, it can’t for the life of me imagine how one ties the legs of a cow together without loosing all your teeth and your bollocks! 😀