19 June 2010

Volcanic Cows

I've heard a couple of versions of this story, this is the more plausible one. At around the time of the recent volcanic eruptions, a cow in Iceland gave birth to triplets, a rare enough occurrence in itself. As the calves happened to be two female and one male, they were immediately named Eyja, Fjalla and Jökull. Eyja and Fjalla, at least, will produce more milk for having names, as a study at the University of Newcastle, reported in The Times, has shown that cows with names give more milk. So no more Cow 214. If you are interested in Icelandic cows, there is a webpage devoted to them.
And if you are travelling in Iceland, I recommend a stop at the Cowshed Café, near Mývatn, where you can look at the cows through a window while you drink your coffee, as you can see from my photo, taken last summer.

2 comments:

  1. From Volcanic Cows to Viking Mice?
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/north_east_orkney_and_shetland/10403052.stm

    Kay

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  2. Thanks for the link. This particular study is a new one on me, though Viking mice have been done before, see http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7645908.stm

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