Is it okay to keep just one cow? Sometimes people on my dairy cow forums online say you can’t.
We’ve been noticing lately that there are folks worrying about other folks keeping a single family dairy cow. The objection offered is that cows are herd animals and should never, therefore, be kept singly. We guess the same folks must worry about keeping just one dog, since dogs are pack animals.
Neither our experience nor any of our research supports this notion.
What people are forgetting, we think, is domestication. Bos taurus and bos indicus, as well as canis familiaris (dogs), are species which have, for thousands of years, been companion species to humans, living and working in intimate association with us. Among cows, this is especially true in the setting of subsistence agriculture, where cows are often draft animals, as well as being milked and raised for beef. Cows have interacted as individuals in human settings for, anthropologists tell us, more than ten thousand years.
It is further to be noted that dairy cows are only dairy cows if they make milk, and they only make milk after having babies. If there is a baby in the picture, the cow has cow company, as well as people company.
One might speculate as to whether the cow minds, personally, the lack of other cows in her daily affairs. We’re not sure how one would know. History would testify that they don’t go into a decline or develop a bad attitude about it, because people have been keeping a single family cow for hundreds, if not thousands, of years, with great success, if success may be measured by milk, happy farmers, and healthy, productive cows.
The One-cow Revolution 
We were just a one cow family—a totally novice homesteading family. And we loved our first Jersey family cow named Kristina. But she was never alone, for we surrounded her with our love and the companionship of dogs, cats, sheep, and even a broken down old 4-H horse. But she also had her first boy calf, but then especially her first girl calf—and that first heifer was the first of your own “one cow revolution”. 🐮
And we are grateful to this day!
We also keep a single family cow. She is a treasure and adored by our six children. The only time they aren’t outside with her is when the temperature drops below -10. But then she has a couple of sheep buddies, one of whom still sleeps on her back sometimes. It did take her three months or so to adjust (although it may have been because her arrival was a bit traumatic as her foot fell through the trailer and she required extra medical care).
Your cow sounds like a lucky girl.
Maybe your could share what symptoms of distress she showed in those months? Other people might find it helpful!
Thank you!
Mostly she bellowed a lot. She was already bred at the time, so she wasn’t in heat. She was also a bit squirrely when we took her back to pasture for awhile, running all over the property and kicking up her heels. That may have been due to our inexperience though.
Bellowing sounds like calling to see if there were other cows, but the running and kicking are sheer ebullience – signs she’s happy and glad to be out!