My crazy sleep pattern continues as I awoke at 3:45 am to pee and couldn't fall back asleep until 5ish. Oy! Anyway, managed to get out of bed around 9:45 am and headed out to the pool an hour later. I did a bunch of laps and other exercises, which felt great. But when I got out of the pool to walk back, the sun was super hot, and I was so tired by the time I got back. A lot of water, food and a nap helped.
Later in the day, Nitsan and Efrat returned from their respective jobs: Nitsan from the army and Efrat from the day care. Nitsan is so cute in her uniform! Today is Efrat's turn to visit her mom in Tel Adashim, a nearby moshav and farm. On the way, we visited some family at the oldest moshav in Israel, Nahalal. They were proud to show us "the robot": the automated cow milking/feeding/washing system. Very impressive.
Each cow has a tag that the machine scans and sends the info to the computer. The computer tracks how much food a cow should get, how much milking should be done at that time based on previous milking and other info about the milk itself. The machine scans the teats to look for them so it can latch on and milk her. It's crazy. One cow was so pregnant, she didn't have much in the way of teats (such a fun word!) so it just kept moving over and over her to try to find them. After the milking and feeding, the cows is released to wander over to the massage station. Really, it is where the cow gets a nice shower, but the image is truly hilarious. Imagine a large yellow car wash brush rubbing a cow up and down. I could definitely use one of those...The whole thing was pretty cool, but it makes me wonder: don't cows still need personal attention? Don't they need love? Nothing like this can be totally automated; there is a human component, but still. While I was very impressed, I was also a bit skeptical.
Our next stop was Tel Adashim and it's more "traditional" dairy. They have way more cows but still, each cow there is scanned and the info on the milk components are tracked by computer. But the cows can be milked 8 or 9 at a time. I really like cows so I tried to approach some while they ate, but they were afraid of me sadly. We saw newborn calves in standing room only cages to strengthen their legs and older babies in larger pens. It is hard to see animals in cages...even chickens which I do not like as much. They keep chickens there for eggs; they were caged but it wasn't as horrific as some pictures I have seen. Fresh eggs right from the farm have a different taste than store bought. I need to get more free range eggs from farmers...
Anyway, it was nice to visit a bit with Efrat's relatives, many of whom I have met several times before. Though I will never remember their names or who is whom, it's nice to reconnect. Her mother, however, does not remember me because of her Alzheimer's. Still, she seems ok and has a regular caregiver.
I didn't take my camera on this outing so I missed out on awesome farm pics. I guess I was thinking that I had seen that place before, when in fact, there were many things I would like to have recorded like the cow massager. Note to self: always have camera nearby! Always! I suppose we will all have to use our imagination to really capture that one.
No comments:
Post a Comment