Sober Preparations before Buying a Cow

[Guest guest]

{{HKDD: Very nice letter from Madhava Gosh prabhu. I reformatted it so it

will be

easier to read when you print it out and tape it up on your wall. Here's the

address for ISKCON Law 507: Minimum Cow Protection Standards

http://www.iscowp.com/cowprotection/standards/standards.html }}

 

[Text 3039562 from COM]

 

>

> I still think the best thing to do is buy a cow or two in the city, and just

> utilize their products in front of everybody's eyes. People will see: this

> guy's doing the right thing for the environment: composting garden waste and

> vegetable scraps and using an ox cart to a) distribute prasad, b) run his

> construction business, c) run his landscaping business (supplying compost to

> customers), or d) pick up the children from school--and he's getting milk,

> and his garden is abundant.

 

First off, please don't run out and buy a cow. I know NV would be more than

happy

to donate one. New Talaban is even closer, and my guess is they would have no

objection to donating one either.

 

Second, hope for the best, plan for the worst. Assume that it turns out to be

a

complete flop, and ends up losing money and no one wants to keep up with it.

Getting a cow and breeding her, means someone needs to be thinking about the

next

potentially 18 years that calf will live. If it is a cow, then it will not

even

be bred, because that will continue the cycle. If an ox, it will be 2 years

before you can do productive work (pulling too much weight can deform soft

growing

bones), then after a work career, several more years when he will be too old

to

do much.

 

Have you read the standards? They specify that before a calf is born, secure

arrangements for it's entire life be made before breeding. You can't count on

raising and caring for cows out of cash flow. This mistake has been made at NV

and

repeated dozens of times around the movement; young idealists start out like

gangbusters, everyone encourages them in order to get milk they can

rationalize as

protected, then the milk and enthusiasm runs out, the support of those

interested

only in the milk evaporates, and a few sincere souls get stuck holding the

bag,

with little resources or emotional support. Then when the inevitable happens,

some cows die unnecessarily, those struggling to keep it together get lashing

attacks from the narrow minded about how bad a job they are doing.

 

You can't depend on cash flow. If the cash flow is there, fine, it can

always be

used, but you can't depend on it. You need to have enough money put into a

trust

fund up front that the income from the trust will be sufficient to maintain the

cow

for a lifetime. Be thinking around $10, 000 per cow. So a cow and calf,

somewhere

near $20,000 set aside before starting. A portion of this can be in land,

barn,

spring, fences, etc. Of course, urban land will be higher.

 

An alternative to buying land in the city, would be to put aside enough to

ship

the cow and calf back to say New Talaban if that is where you got the cow from.

Since they should already have some provision for the cow's maintenance, set

up a

fund for the maintenance of the calf, based on the cost of maintaining it at

NT

instead of in a city. So you would then need only $10,000 in a fund for calf's

maintenance, and estimate a $1 per mile set aside for returning the cow and

calf

to NT if the program goes belly up.

 

Then, you could maintain her and the calf out of cash flow , with the

provision

in place that if the program failed, they would have a ride back to NT and NT

would be assured of a cash flow for maintaining the calf they would not have

had

otherwise. These figures are meant to illustrative and not actual - you need

to

do some work on that. A good commander always leaves himself a clear line of

retreat. so, having now covered contingency planning for the worst outcome,

let

us turn to hope for the best.

 

I worked for a while in New York City, and also had the fantasy of having a

cow in

Manhattan. Surprisingly, I came to the conclusion it was doable, given

enough

working capital, not to get into too much detail. The most daunting obstacle

was

not the actual care of the cow, but the legal barriers and paperwork. Before

you

make serious plans to bring a cow to LA, you better very carefully research

the

zoning and other laws to make sure you can actually do so. You may have to

get a

zoo license or something creative. Be sure you know what permits or

restrictions

you need to operate under.

 

The other thing to bear in mind is that it can be come an overwhelming

responsibility to care for a cow. My wife grew up on a dairy farm, and they

never, in her whole life there, took a vacation or an overnight trip. Every

excursion was limited by the fact that they had to be home in time to milk at

night. Dairy is a 7 day a week commitment. They have to be fed everyday. This

is

a major commitment, much more so than the average American conditioned person

can

even conceive of.

 

Assuming you clear the lifetime support and legal barriers, get a committed

person

or team of persons, and actually do get a cow into LA providing some milk for

the

temple or for devotees. Personally, I think it could be a huge money maker.

If

you can actually get a milk drinker to make eye contact with the cow, and spend

some quality time with her, you may get lots of support. Especially if the

pitch

is that the money is not being spent directly, but going into endowment funds

that

will be supporting cow protection programs in perpetuity, you may be able to

attract some large donations. I am not talking about $100 or less donations,

but

4 and 5 figure donations. As you hit each new $10,000 (or whatever) plateau,

you

could authorize the breeding of another cow. There are some endless

possibilities.

 

So proceed cautiously with your vision. but let me encourage you to proceed.