When I think of cows, I don’t think relaxation; I think of anxiously peering over country gates or scuttling round the perimeter of fields, whispering: “Please don’t hurt me.” They’re huge, aren’t they? I’m not anti-cow, but I wouldn’t put them up there with a bubble bath and a vodka and tonic. Yet here I am, leaning against the warm flank of a dairy cross called Soft Face, my pulse slowing as I sense a ton of black-and-white bovine breathe gently beneath me. We’re both lying in the sweet-smelling hay in a quiet barn; Soft Face is “cudding” – regurgitating then chewing her lunch – while I stroke her face (as silky as her name suggests). I am deeply, blissfully relaxed.
Forget goat yoga and welcome to cow cuddling, a wellness experience like no other offered by an unlikely trio of therapists: brother and sister farmers Fiona Wilson and James McCune and Fi’s husband, Will. Dumble Farm, the family’s East Yorkshire farm since the 1970s, could no longer sustain a dairy herd due to years of flooding, so the trio decided to move into conservation-grazing Highland cattle and managing habitat for endangered lapwings and other species. That meant selling the milkers, but they couldn’t bear to part with five of them – and cow cuddling was born.
It took five months to train the cuddle cows, working out how and when they were calmest, and getting them used to strangers – you definitely shouldn’t just walk into a field and try it yourself. Dumble Farm has honed the art: a bonus silage feed before visitors arrive at lunchtime, and the girls are full, laidback and ready for love.
They certainly seem it when we – that’s me, and Durham couple Craig and Amy, who have come for Amy’s birthday surprise – enter the barn. It feels deeply peaceful (we all automatically start whispering) and all five cuddlers are lying down. To start with I’m a little shy – am I really allowed to lie down and rest my face against this vast creature? Is it wise? – but the minute I let myself go, resting my head on brown-and-white beauty Cloud, I never want to stop. I move between her and Soft Face, watching their jaws move, stroking them and soaking up their warmth. When we’re ready to move on, James takes us into a pen of Highland calves – shaggy, stumpy and outrageously cute – and we spend a blissful half-hour combing them, occasionally getting nudged or nibbled if we’re not combing hard enough.
If this sounds like heaven, it is, but it’s also almost as hard to book as Glastonbury: there are only six places on each adults-only £50 session (three hours of cuddles, calf brushing, walking the older calves on halters and touring the farm) and they sell out almost instantly. Visitors come from all over the country and one woman even came from Hawaii to visit the Highland calf she sponsors (another Dumble Farm sideline). Some visitors are keen to tackle their fears; others just love cows. I seem to be one of them now: my hands are greasy from calf brushing and I’m covered with straw, but buzzing and blissed out with bovine love.
Is it really good for you? Who knows? Fi says Will comes to sit with the cows when he’s stressed, and visitors with anxiety and autism have told her how calming the experience is. Amy says she found it “very calming, tranquil. When you’re relaxing, lying next to them, it’s really therapeutic; it’s lovely.” Craig’s happy too: he “fell in love” with Highland calf Meredith (and groomed her so proficiently she fell asleep). How do the cows feel about their new role as wellness gurus? “If they didn’t like it, they wouldn’t do it,” says Fi. “They enjoy the attention.”
