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From: minsky@media-lab.MEDIA.MIT.EDU (Marvin Minsky)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,sci.bio
Subject: Re: cow magnets
Message-ID: <4821@media-lab.MEDIA.MIT.EDU>
Date: 10 Jan 91 23:32:39 GMT
References: <1991Jan10.210958.14351@xn.ll.mit.edu>
Reply-To: minsky@media-lab.media.mit.edu (Marvin Minsky)
Organization: MIT Media Lab, Cambridge MA
Lines: 11

In article <1991Jan10.210958.14351@xn.ll.mit.edu> rp@jupiter.ll.mit.edu (Richard Pavelle) writes:
>
>A recent Edmund Scientific catalog (#11N1), Page 149, lists
>Cow Magnets. These magnets.. "allow farmers to trap metal in the 
>stomach of cows". Can someone explain why/how these are used?

To catch bits of iron -- nails, etc., and give them time to be
digested before passing further and damaging the cow.  The ruminant
has several digestion chambers.  I think the magnet is largish and
plastic-coated, and stays in.  I don't know how you get the cow to
swallow it.