Jon's (Fourth Grade) Science Experiment: "Music and Milk"

The Hypothesis
My hypothesis is that we would get the best production of milk with Christmas carols. The three types of music I used were Christmas, country, and rock. I got this hypothesis from research I did, in which I learned that cows hate anger. The author of the research was Temple Grandin of Colorado State University, who wrote a book entitled Animals Make Us Human.

The Experiment
We wanted to find out which type of music inspired the cow to produce the most milk. First, I rounded up our cow. Then I put her in the milking stand. I plugged a radio in next to the milking stand. For each of three milkings , Mom and I fed her one-half pounds of grain. First we listened to rock. The cow gave us ten cups of milk in the first five minutes of milking. Next we listened to country. The cow gave nineteen cups of milk in the first five minutes. Lastly, we played Christmas, and got seven cups of milk in five minutes.

Each time we finished milking we poured the milk from the steel bucket into a filter, which got all non-milk substances out of the milk. We then poured the milk into a half-gallon mason jar, and we measured the milk.

I took notes through the whole experiment. The diet of the cow stayed the same throughout the three milking experiments.

Conclusion
My results were not at all what I had expected. My hypothesis was proven wrong. The cow produced the least amount of milk with Christmas music. I know the results are accurate, because my mom and I measured the milk “letdown” with mason jars. I used two books to do the research. They were Animals Make Us Human by Temple Grandin and Keeping a Family Cow by Joan S. Grohman.

(Now if only the Global Warming "Scientists" jetting to Copenhagen would just emulate Jon's integrity in their research!)