Originally posted by Seldsum : They also need to have given birth once, so usually it will be around early winter that you start getting your first milk. Since the duration of pregnancy in cows is nine months, one year is considered an entire cycle by farmers who need to keep tabs on their dairy cattle. Cows must calve to produce milk and the lactation cycle is the period between one calving and the next. 2. Every mammal goes through the cycle of pregnancy and birth in order to lactate. After this, farmers generally aim for their cows to calve again every 12 months. People do eat dairy cows once the cows can no longer produce enough milk to meet the dairy industry’s abnormally high standards. Female cows produce milk after giving birth. This solves the mystery of whether cows produce milk all the time. Male "cows" are not cows. Approximately once per year a cow will give birth to a calf. I really did not like any of the answers. Dairy cows may be found either in herds or dairy farms where dairy farmers own, manage, care for, and collect milk from them, or on commercial farms. It’s possible to artificially stimulate lactation through hormonal interference. Modern cows may be in pain if not milked (if they are producing milk) partly because they have been bred to produce larger and larger amounts of milk so they probably poroduce too much milk. Male calves are generally considered a low-value waste product by the industry and are usually slaughtered at five days of age. Cows are pregnant for nine months. Youngest DC is 3 and I expressed milk for 9 months, nothing since. A cow that has never had a calf, but is pregnant for the first time is not milked. time will still be milked for the first 7 months of pregnancy. The Milk Can Be Produced Only When Cows Get Pregnant:-When a cow gets pregnant, these mammary glands are able to produce the desired amount of milk needed for the young ones to be provided with but the milkmen allow the calf to feed only a small amount and milks the rest of cow’s milk for the purpose of profit making. Because dairy cows are pushed to their physical limits on factory farms , the meat from their bodies is generally considered lower quality (or “low-grade”) and is used in cheaper products such as ground beef. Like humans, a cow is pregnant with her calf for nine months. Heifers (young female cows) will usually be pregnant for the first time when they are around 15 months old. In an ideal world, cows calve every 12 months. Mature cows produce about 25% more milk then two-year-olds. cows can produce milk and not be pregnant as long as they had a calf at most about a year earlier. This ensures a constant supply of milk from the herd. While female calves are slaughtered or kept alive to produce milk, male calves are often taken away from their mothers when they are as young as 1 day old to be chained in tiny stalls for three to 18 weeks and raised for veal. The Veal Connection If you drink milk, you’re subsidizing the veal industry. "Even estrogens at concentrations 100 times higher than usually found in native milk did not cause any physiological effects in the present study," added Majdic. In commercial units, pregnant cows will be separated from the milking herd about 2 months before they are due to give birth (classed as ‘dry cows’). Calves are taken from their mother’s side shortly after birth, and the milk intended for them is instead shipped off for humans to drink. A cow should spend 10 to 14 hours a day lying in the stall, resting, and making milk. A cow doesn’t have to be pregnant to provide milk. How do cows breed? This usually happens when a cow is around two years old. However, the range can vary from 4 to 11 gallons a day. So, dairy farmers forcefully make their cows pregnant, by hand, every year, to get them to produce milk. You might think that would be a simple birds-and-bees thing–put a cow and a bull in a paddock and give them some privacy. Although cows become sexually mature around the age of 10 months old, it is not advised to allow them to become pregnant until they are close to one and a half years old. No, only cows that have already given birth will produce milk. Dairy cows lactate (produce milk) for about 10 months after calving. Global milk production. This, in turn, prompts the brain to release oxytocin, which is the key hormone for the breasts to begin releasing the milk. This video explains when cows start to make milk. But in the dairy industry, they’re repeatedly impregnated to keep the milk supply flowing. This ensures a constant supply of milk spend 10 to 14 hours a day lying in the stall,,... 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