Monday, July 9, 2007

Lots of MOOlah

So last week we had dinner with our very good friends, Eric and Heidi. They live on and operate what has grown into a huge dairy farm, in pristine Lancaster County. They now herd a total of almost 750 cows. Not surprisingly, we had large steaks for dinner. When I asked Heidi if we were eating one of their former "employees" she simply smiled and nodded.
After dinner, Eric took us on a tour of the new facility.
I took some pictures....
Cows live here:
The amazing thing about the barn, is that it features what could be called "the worlds largest toilet." At the push of a button, thousands of gallons of water flushes through the center of the barn, washing away all manner of poo and dirt. This keeps the barn spotlessly clean, and all the ladies fresh and happy. The cool part is that all the water is recycled, and the whole process is very eco-friendly.

Next: Cows get milked here..

This is the milking parlor, each cow has a special tag that is read by a scanner. The amount of milk produced is logged, and tracked by a computer. If it detects any problems, on their way out it singles out the cow into a special gated area. Very cool.

Next:
Milk goes here...


Thats a whole lotta milk..

And finally off to be processed.

So now you know where milk comes from.

At the end of the day, each cow gets a nice warm hug and a kiss from Heidi.

Just like this.

Needless to say that the farm is lovely. We had a great time.
Thanks to Eric and Heidi for a great evening!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

HA! The only thing missing is the pic of you driving the huge tractor. (I have one from my tour :)

Just talked to Heids today about nudging you to post again. And here it is... with her as the topic. LOVE IT.

Waiting to hear of your vacation.
:)

Anonymous said...

Looks great! Eric said you have it all figured out! Nice job! Thanks for the dairy promo!
Eric and Heidi and Luke and Austin