Perhaps you have seen pictures of the big cow, towering over his cow friends and acquaintances. All of the cows are beautiful, of course, but Knickers is undeniably, impressively large. At six-foot-four-inches and 2,800 pounds, he’s even being called Australia’s largest cow (a claim I’m far more inclined to believe than Britain’s “fattest dog”).
So what’s his story? Knickers, a seven-year-old Holstein Friesian steer (a castrated male cow), was first purchased by Geoff Pearson when he was about a year old. He was meant to be a “coach,” a leader among cattle.
“He was always a standout steer from the others, a bit bigger than the rest,” Pearson, who is based in Myalup, near Perth, explained. But he continued to grow bigger and bigger, becoming larger than any man or cow could’ve dreamed. (This is assuming we know the dreams of cows, which we do not.) Knickers size was ultimately his saving grace. Per the BBC, when Pearson “tried to put him up for auction last month, meat processors said they simply couldn’t handle him.”
The Guardian pointed out that other cows could also grow to Knickers size, if left alive. “They probably don’t have the opportunity to grow to their full potential,” Pearson told them. “There could be other animals that could grow to this size but didn’t get the chance.”
To all of this, I offer up a modest proposal: free Knickers, who came so close to a hideous betrayal.
Also, free all the cows.
