Despite the fact that they were shipped to slaughter. Today's farms couldn't be any different. Cows must be pregnant to give milk - just like any other mammal. And to continue to give the huge volumes of milk required by the dairy industry to keep consumers happy, they are kept pregnant year-round. Today cows may give up to 100 pounds of milk every day - 10 times more than what they were expected to produce a generation ago.
Cows have the same gestation period as human women - nine months.
Once their baby is born, it is taken away from them at birth. The factory farms want to keep every last drop of milk to sell to the consuming public. After about five births, the old heifers can many times no longer walk and certainly can no longer keep delivering babies. Many times they're lifted by forklift or tractor bucket, since they cannot walk. The young heifers replace them.