After hearing a mysterious knocking at his window in the dead of night, Ryan Phillips checked to make sure all of his doors and windows were locked. Anyone could have been trying to break into his home in Williamsburg, Virginia.
Phillips’s bleary-eyed epiphany revealed the perpetrator instantly.
Phillips wrote on Facebook that he “woke to the loud sound of thudding,” sprang out of bed, and “rushed to check what was going on.” The founder of the farm animal sanctuary Life With Pigs recognized it was his rescued cow Jenna who was looking for affection.
In an interview, Phillips says: “Jenna knocks frequently, numerous times daily. When we’re dining or just hanging out, she’ll come over and stare at the window to make sure we notice she’s there.”
This practise, which began when the cow was just a few months old, is now, depending on her mood, one of her most beloved activities.
When she needs a cuddle, “she’ll knock with her horns to let us know,” Phillips added. Sometimes she’ll ask for carrots, and other times she’ll spy overripe bananas in the fruit bowl and claim them as her own.
When Phillips first took in Jenna, she was just 3 days old, and she mooed for food. As Phillips bottle-fed Jenna from infancy, she rapidly realised that knocking would bring him to her much more quickly, along with her milk.
Phillips remarked, “That first bottle was the beginning of friendship, and from that point on we were great friends. It’s as if I’ve been adopted as a surrogate mother by her. When the bottles were empty, she would try to coax more milk out of me by head butting my stomach as a calf does to its mother. She’s my little girl, for sure.”
The rescued farm animals at the refuge are all friends of Jenna’s, but she still likes Phillips and will create a racket to get his attention, no matter what time of day it is.
Phillips remarked, “She knows she’s cherished, safe, and that everybody cherishes her.” The thought of life without her is intolerable to me. Every morning I jump out of bed thrilled that she is in my life. What a happy guy I am to have a best buddy who weighs 1,400 pounds and likes to hang out, snuggle, and embrace in her barn.
