PART 2 By special request: WASHING!

When you show your animals, of course you want to present them in the very best condition for judging.  This means they must be clean and clipped.

Washing a dairy heifer or cow is quite a chore.  They must be clean everywhere...and I mean EVERYWHERE.

Because they are outside animals, they have dirt from head to toe.  They also have manure pretty much all over them in one form or another:  fresh and mooshy, dried balls or clumps, or ground up manure dust.

Items I use for washing include:
water hose
garden hose sprayer nozzle
household scrub brushes (nylon bristles)
soap
bath towels

If using stock show facilities, there will be a "wash rack".  That is a place with rails to tie your animal's halter and water hydrants to hook up to.  If you are doing this at home, you will need someplace close to a water hydrant where the animal can be tied.

You don't need a super long hose.  The more you have, the more it will get stepped on and tangled.
Before you begin scrubbing, take a good while to soak the animal completely.  This will loosen the dirt.  The more they are soaked, the faster they will come clean.

Everyone has their opinion on soap.  Some people use dishwashing soap like Dawn.  Some people use shampoo like Suave.  I like the expensive stuff:  Orvus.  It comes in a giant jar like jumbo mayonnaise.  It is a semi-solid at room temperature.  As you rub it into their hair, it melts, and it's like the dirt just runs out.  I love it.  I wish they could be wash-rack clean every day. You use the scrub brushes to get them clean right down to their hide.  Their hair is going to be clipped really short, so we want them squeaky clean.  Don't get carried away on the backbone (top line) because we don't want any hair loss up there. (I'll get to that soon in the "Clipping" article.)

Scrub the body/torso (from the neck to the pins).  Also wash the belly and the udder and teats.

Scrub the head:  down the face, outside the ears, under the jaw, behind the top of head (poll).  Just don't get water in the ears (cover them with your hand/bend them closed one at a time).   Be nice and wipe water away from the eyes.  

Scrub the neck and chest-type area (brisket).
Scrub the rear end (pins, tail head, flank, vagina, anus, top/sides/underneath the tail).  Dissolve, scrub, pull-off and/or clip off any manure that hangs on to tiny hairs.

Scrub the legs.
Scrub the "armpits".
Scrub the hooves...tops, fronts, sides, backs, in between, and even underneath if you can get to it.
Their hooves can be black or white, solid colored, striped, or blocks of color.  Each hoof can be different on the same animal.  

Use a damp rag inside the ears...all the way in as far as you can reach with the cloth stretched over your fingers.  Scrub scrub scrub, and dig for potatoes!  Some shy away, but most like it.  (You should also clean the ears again with a clean damp rag about half an hour before you show.)

I feel bad for my girls having to be bathed in cold hydrant water, so I always towel them dry.  If it is very cold, I try to borrow a warm blower to dry most of their bodies...except the top lines.  Heat will make the hair shed, and we don't want that.