with a taste for contemporary music has been named the world's smallest by the Guinness World Records book.Guinness says the sheep-sized bovine from the West Yorkshire region of northern England measures roughly 33 inches (84 centimetres) from hind to foot.
The 11-year-old Dexter cow is named Swallow and her owner, Caroline Ryder, said she would spend Thursday either grazing with her herd or listening to BBC radio in her cowshed.
The Dexter, an Irish mountain breed, is the latest in compact dairy production. It seems that many people in Europe, and a few in the U.S.A., are clamoring to buy these cows. They are “the world’s most efficient, cutest and tastiest cows," according to one of the websites that sells the breed. These mini-moo's can be milked daily, and for self-sufficient types, is a great investment.
For between £200 and £2,000, people can buy a cow that stands no taller than a large German shepherd dog, gives 16 pints of milk a day that can be drunk unpasteurised, keeps the grass “mown” and will be a family pet for years before ending up in the freezer.
The Dexter, a mountain breed from Ireland, is perfect for cattle-keeping on a small scale, but other breeds are being artificially created to compete with it, including the Mini-Hereford and the Lowline Angus, which has been developed by the Australian government to stand no more than 39in high but produce 70% of the steak of a cow twice its size.
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