

Cows and cow protection

Cows and Krishna

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An Ox? What’s That?




—Srimad-Bhagavatam 3.2.29, purport









Comfort for the Cows


Srila Prabhupada writes in a purport to the Srimad- Bhagavatam (10.8.16), “[Krishna’s] first business is to give all comfort to the cows and the brahmanas. In fact, comfort for the brahmanas is secondary, and comfort for the cows is His first concern.”

Because Krishna loves the cows, His devotees not only protect them but also see to their comfort, a practice that has spiritual, psychological, and practical material benefits.

For thousands of years people have understood that for a cow to do her best job of providing milk she must be peaceful and happy. In this century, scientists discovered that the cow produces a hormone called oxytocin that helps her “let down” her milk. If the cow is frightened or annoyed, the oxytocin is shut off and the milk flow stops. This means that human beings must be well behaved around cows to get the most milk.

Bulls and oxen must also be given comfort, and we gain by treating them kindly.

In earlier times, when people relied on the ox for economic survival, scriptures of various countries taught people how to be kind to their animals. Writing in The Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge in the nineteenth century, Reverend B. B. Edwards comments on biblical injunctions for the treatment of working oxen:

The ox was best fed when employed in treading out the corn; for the divine law, in many of whose precepts the benevolence of the Deity conspicuously shines, forbade to muzzle him, and, by consequence, to prevent him from eating what he would of the grain he was employed to separate from the husks

In the Mahabharata (Anushasana Parva, Section 23), Bhishmadeva censures “those who set bullocks to work before the animals attain to sufficient age, those who bore the noses of bullocks and other animals for controlling them better while employed in work, and those who keep animals always tethered.”

Modern workers have discovered the wisdom of these scriptural principles while trying to bring improved animal- traction technology to third world countries. For one thing, an animal forced to do heavy work before his body develops will be stunted in growth. He’ll never become the powerful assistant he could have been.

Furthermore, proper exercise for bulls, oxen, and cows is essential to keep them in good shape for working, breeding, or milking. Not only will it keep their muscles in tone; it also improves their disposition and makes them easier to work with.

Finally, perhaps some of the most practical gains from animal comfort have come from improved animal-traction equipment for oxen. For centuries, inventors have ignored ox equipment while concentrating on making better equipment for horses. But led by the inventions of the late Jean Nolle, workers in recent decades have discovered that putting greater comfort into the yoke, the harness, and other equipment helps the ox do significantly more work.

Common sense tells us that when an animal is comfortable doing his work, he can pull more weight longer without tiring—just as you can carry a heavy backpack longer if it’s designed so the straps are kind to your shoulders. Only recently have modern designers taken advantage of this while designing ox equipment.

Sometimes certain types of equipment gain popularity because of tradition and aesthetic appeal, but testing shows that an uncomfortable ox works with less power. The head yoke was formerly popular in parts of Europe because it provides easy control for animals, requiring a minimum of training. Unfortunately, what is gained in ease of training appears lost in working efficiency. Comparing the head yoke with a three- padded German ox collar designed for ox comfort, researcher Rolf Minhorst found that when the oxen used the ox collar their efficiency went up 21% for plowing, 58% for pulling a double-hitch wagon, and 71% for pulling a single-hitch cart.

So modern researchers are beginning to discover the same principle Krishna showed long ago: both human beings and animals benefit when we pay careful attention to the comfort of the cow and the bull. Srila Prabhupada notes, “When the bull and the cow are in a joyful mood, it is to be understood that the people of the world are also in a joyful mood.”

Krishna’s Kind Solution: Train Calves, Don’t Eat Them!











The calf takes a few steps forward, then stops.

“Get up!”















Names and Personal Relationship














One Family’s Cow Protection




An Intimate Milking Scene






Traditional Methods of Cow Care






The Rest of our Cow Family




Enough Grazing Land




Cow Dung—A Treasure



Protecting Cows, Thinking of Krishna





The Farmer and the Cows



Government policies often drive farmers off the land. One important exception came in the early days of American settlement. In WherebyWeThrive, Smithsonian agricultural historian John Schlebecker documents numerous bills and provisions that encouraged Americans to take up farming.

One government policy, that of making large tracts of land available to farmers at little cost, was a great stimulus to farming. This practice was similar to the Vedic system under which the kshatriyas (leaders) distribute land to vaishyas (farmers) for production. But as we have seen, the particular type of agricultural development the U.S. government promoted has led ultimately to a precarious situation for everyone.

What Went Wrong?

The major problem was that the whole agricultural policy developed around centralization and animal slaughter, especially cow slaughter. In contrast, Krishna advises in the Bhagavad-gita that central to economic development in a varnashrama society is go-rakshya—cow protection. Let’s examine how a policy of cow protection keeps things from getting out of hand.

Ox-Power Farming
Keeps People in the Country

As I’ve explained, cow protection implies using the oxen for farming. While Mother Cow provides milk, Father Bull produces grain for his human children and is valued as a beloved member of society. One common objection to using animal power is that it takes a lot of people to produce grain this way. If we use a tractor, the argument goes, one per-son produces grain, and the rest are free to do other things.

But free to do what? Free to work in hellish factories, to live in nightmarish cities, to eat the flesh of innocent animals, and to buy an endless variety of artificial services and manufactured goods—without ever becoming satisfied. That’s not really freedom; it’s slavery. It’s becoming a slave to manufacturers and to the senses. Cow protection protects human society by saving us from all these things. Farmers work hard, but they’re free from the oppressive environment of the city.

Cow Protection Means
Protecting Mother Earth

Protecting cows is the most important component of protecting the earth. In Sanskrit go-rakshya means “cow protection.” But it can also mean “protection of the earth,” be-cause the word go means both “cow” and “earth.” The Srimad-Bhagavatam presents several accounts in which Mother Earth, Bhumi Devi, assumes the form of a cow. So the cow is the representative of Mother Earth, and when the cow and the bull are mistreated, Mother Earth withdraws her bounty.

Under the varnashrama system, small ox-powered farms can benefit human society, benefit animals, and benefit the earth. A simple life in the country working with animals provides a natural, wholesome environment for human society. On a small farm, the animals can be given the most caring personal treatment, and the earth can be saved by thoughtful cultivation and the use of manure.

The proper use of manure—critical to protecting the earth—can best be achieved with small-scale ox-powered farms. As we hear from Sir Albert Howard, the grandfather of organic gardening, “No permanent or effective system of agriculture has ever been devised without the animal. Many attempts have been made, but sooner or later they break down. The replacement of livestock by artificials is always followed by disease the moment the original store of fertility is exhausted.”1

In The Violence of the Green Revolution, physicist and agricultural philosopher Vandana Shiva details how chemical farming causes desertification and ruins the soil. Manure from confinement cattle operations also causes immense environmental destruction. Authors like Jeremy Rifkin justifiably decry another horror of the cattle industry—the destruction of the Amazon rain forest for meat.2 Exploiting cows ruins the environment. But we’re missing out if we fail to see that cow protection is the most potent way to bring devastated lands back to lush growth.

With small-scale farming, the proper use of cow manure can provide the most valuable protection and enhancement of the soil. Only a small-scale farmer can fully use the miracle available in cow manure, because he’s the one who truly cares for bulls and cows.

Still, someone may object that small-scale ox-powered farming doesn’t make farmers a lot of money. It’s true that this may mean farmers can’t buy so many goods. But simple living eases the strain on the earth’s resources.

Environmentalists are anxious to fight the pollution of the earth. If only they could realize the need to protect the cows and work the oxen. If all cows were well cared for and all our grain were grown locally with oxen, so many workers would be involved that the whole world would become practically de- urbanized. With no one to work in the factories, no money squirreled away for manufactured goods, and no need to ship food around on vast transportation infrastructures, a huge burden on the earth would be lifted. Producing food and grain with oxen would also put the scythe to the need for petroleum (and the devastating oil wars that come with it).

Cow Protection
Helps Sense Control

The word go has another meaning in Sanskrit. Besides “cow” and “earth,” the word also means “senses.” Krishna has designed the varnashrama social system to help different types of people bring their senses under control so they can make spiritual advancement. The farming and mercantile class is partly motivated by the mode of passion. In city life, this passion is fanned like a fire, and the urge to consume and to enjoy the senses becomes greater and greater. As Krishna explains in the Bhagavad-gita, lust to enjoy the sense objects causes anger, which then gives rise to delusion and bewilderment. The whole structure of urban life turns out to be a formula for violence and insanity.

But Krishna’s varnashrama system is the opposite. In Krishna’s system, farmers have the chance to exercise their brawny nature in situations where it is needed to control their animals. When a farmer uses his grit constructively—either to work the animals or simply to accomplish the hard tasks of farming—he becomes purified. And when the cows and oxen are well treated, they’re affectionate and obedient the next moment after they’re scolded.

On the other hand, in some situations, especially when milking cows, the farmer must learn to control his moods carefully. The cow won’t give milk if she’s upset by angry talk or tension.

If someone wants to be the controller, working with the animals provides a constructive outlet for this desire, as described by draft animal technical consultant Jean Nolle,

You should know that draft animals are pleased to work with their master. It is an honour for them to participate with him in useful work in the field. When the driver requests them to give the best of themselves, they do so. It is also a pleasure for the man to order an animal and to be followed immediately. No President can do the same with the citizens. Animals are more attentive to their duties than we are.3

Milk for Spiritual Understanding

Srila Prabhupada explained that milk nourishes the fine brain tissue needed for understanding spiritual knowledge. Therefore, society needs the cow for spiritual advancement. As Srila Prabhupada put it, “Milking the cow means drawing the principles of religion in liquid form.”4

And only if we protect cows can we be sure of having milk. If we depend on an economic system that exploits the cow instead of protecting her, when that system collapses most cows will be killed and milk will become scarce. Evidently this is happening in the former Society Union with the collapse of state-subsidized agriculture. According to the February issue of Hoard’s Dairyman, milk has become so scarce that a half gallon of milk (less than two liters) costs thirty hours of labor.

If we don’t work the oxen and protect them, they won’t be there for us when petroleum becomes too costly to use for food production. As Jean Nolle observed, “It is an incredible reality that farmers in the [industrialized countries], after having killed all their draft animals, are now sentenced to death by their own stupid economy.” Neglect of cow protection means the end of human civilization.

A Special Way to Remember Krishna

The last and most important reason for cow protection is that it helps us think of Krishna. We can catch glimpses of His attractive and wonderful personality in many ways that would be more difficult without protected cows. When Srila Prabhupada visited Gita Nagari, he told the devotees, “This town life, industrial life, factory life, is asuric [demoniac] life. It is killing human ambition. It is killing civilization.” He encouraged us to set an example by protecting cows and living as Krishna lived:

Krishna, in His natural life, is a village boy in Vrindavana. Vrindavana is a village. There is no factory, there is no motorcar, there are no big, big skyscraper buildings; it is a village. That Krishna likes.… Krishna is so fond of Vrindavana village life, with His cowherd boys and cowherd girls, His gopis, mother Yashoda, father Nanda, Upananda, uncles, big family, the cows and the calves, the trees, the Yamuna River. He is satisfied in that life. So at least those who are Krishna conscious, they should be satisfied with simple life in the village. That is part of Krishna consciousness.… Whatever Krishna has taught by His personal life, by His teaching, to follow that is Krishna consciousness.5


  1. Sir Albert Howard, An Agricultural Testament (Oxford University Press 1940; Rodale Press 1972), p. 43.
  2. Jeremy Rifkin, Beyond Beef: The Rise and Fall of the Cattle Culture (New American Library/Dutton 1992).
  3. Jean Nolle, “Improve Animal Traction Technology,” Animal Traction Network for Africa, Conference Proceedings, Lusaka, Zambia, January 1992.
  4. Srimad-Bhagavatam 1.17.3, purport.
  5. Srila Prabhupada, evening lecture at Gita Nagari Farm, Pennsylvania, July 15, 1976.

Miracle in Manure

I hand personal experience of the miracle of cow manure while I lived at Gita Nagari Farm. In the fall of 1987 I dug a pit two and a half feet deep and filled it with fresh cow manure. I topped it with three inches of soil and compost and transplanted spinach and lettuce into it. Then I covered this hotbed with a cold frame (a four-sided box covered with plastic to let in the sun). The decomposing manure provided heat to grow the plants during the snowy months so that we could offer the Deities fresh garden greens in the winter. (The winter-grown greens were exceptionally flavorful.)

But the real eye-opener for me came the following year when my hotbed, six feet by four, was plowed under to become part of the potato garden. There was a horrible drought over most of the United States that year. Crops were so bad the government had to keep farms alive with disaster relief. Even our potato field looked bad. By the end of July, the tops of most of the potato plants were dry and yellow. But not the three plants that grew over last winter’s hotbed. They just sank their roots into that rich, cool, moisture-holding cow manure and flourished in the hot sun. They were so green and healthy they looked like they’d never heard of the word drought. It was a striking lesson to me about how cow protection also protects the earth.

The Origins of Cow-Killing Economics: Part Two


Starting around 1840, American farming became increasingly centralized. Replacing oxen with horses freed people to move to the cities to work in factories. And the new city dwellers became consumers for the products they’d once grown.

The village miller with his ox-powered grist mill gave way to automated mills in large Midwestern cities. As the mills of the Midwest began selling wastes back to farmers to feed animals meant for meat, the mills and grain companies grew still larger and richer. Grain prices became something for Chicago investors to gamble on.

Better steel-making helped the railroads develop, and refrigerated railroad cars helped great slaughterhouses develop in places like Chicago, St. Louis, and Kansas City. As the twentieth century began, profits from cow slaughter surged. Meat-packers shipped millions of pounds of beef products being exported to Europe. But the biggest force for cow slaughter was yet to arrive—the tractor.

The first big push for the tractor came during World War I when U.S. farmers shipped more than 1.5 million draft animals to Europe for the military. To buy tractors to replace these animals, the farmers took out big loans, risking their land in the process. Within the next two decades, “Gasoline had replaced oats as the main ‘fuel’ used in agricultural operations, freeing millions more acres of grainlands for cash food crops.”

Boosting yields with chemical fertilizers and hybrids, farmers began using more land to grow grain for cash. Grain output shot up fifty percent or more. What to do with all that grain?

The ready availability of a seemingly inexhaustible supply of cheap corn helped to make the United States a nation of steak eaters.… These steers were truly ‘hides stuffed with corn.’ In a sense, this was and is a wasteful use of grain.… But America had lots of grain, and a food system grew up that made it possible—even economically necessary—to run as much grain as possible through livestock.

But American farmers were still turning out more grain than America or the export markets could absorb. When this made grain prices drop, the U.S. Department of Agriculture was stuck: it had to pay huge subsidies to bail out farmers—and then pay to store the excess grain. Meanwhile, grain firms saw profits dwindling. What could be done?

To strategists at the USDA, [and] Cargill and Continental [two multi-national grain firms], the solution to the surplus problem was self-evident. It was to get people in other countries to eat the way Americans did. A global economy in which millions of rice-eaters in Asia were converted to wheat bread was one that absorbed some of the perennial U.S. wheat surpluses. And a food system in which affluent countries bought billions of dollars of U.S. corn and soybeans to feed their beef, hogs, and poultry every year was one that helped the American balance of payments and trade.

In 1954 the U.S. passed a bill, Public Law 480, to get rid of excess grain by turning it into foreign aid. Under P.L. 480, Uncle Sam offered selected countries long-term, low- interest loans with which to buy grain. In many developing countries, this started people eating American wheat instead of locally grown rice and millet.

In newly industrialized countries, grain from P.L. 480 put meat on middle-class plates.

By 1956, under P.L. 480 America exported half of its output of 295 million bushels of feed grains. And after 1962, Europe’s Common Agricultural Policy shielded European Community farmers, so about the only grains America could profitably sell in the EC were feed grains, especially soybeans.

So feed grains took over from food grains. “Livestock rather than people became the main market for American grain, and soybeans and corn ranked with jet aircraft and computers as the country’s major exports.”

Outside America, as people’s incomes rose, they wanted more meat. “Between the late 1950’s and 1983, total world meat production (by volume) increased about two and a half times.” Slightly more than half the increase came from poultry and pig meat, but clearly the goal was to eat like Americans—and this meant eat beef.

Srila Prabhupada notes, “Modern civilization is centered on animal killing.” History, in fact, shows a grim picture: the sacred cow killed for the sacred dollar.

In the short term, the U.S.D.A. and the large grain companies seemed to have solved their problems. Once again big money could be made selling grain. But long term the effects were disastrous, as we shall discuss in the next article of this series.


  1. Robert West Howard, The Vanishing Land (Villard Books, 1985), p. 129.
  2. John Schlebecker, Whereby We Thrive (Iowa State University Press, 1975), pp. 80-81, 157-158.
  3. Howard, op cit, p. 159-160.
  4. Dan Morgan, Merchants of Grain (Viking Press, 1979), p. 98.
  5. Ibid., p. 99.
  6. Ibid., p. 99.
  7. Harry Fornari, Bread Upon the Waters (Aurora Publishers, Inc., 1973), p. 118.
  8. Morgan, op. cit., p. 139.
  9. Phillip Raikes (Catholic Institute for International Relations, 1988), p. 128.
  10. Srimad-Bhagavatam 4.27.11, purport.

Chant Hare Krishna and Draw a Plow



















