THERE WERE Mandies and Carmens and a Roxy, an Alice and even a Rosie but at the end of the day at Virginia Show in Co Cavan yesterday, the lady who emerged victor and won the title of the best cow in Ireland was called Lumville Danois 2.
And with that win a trade secret emerged, because this young cow was wearing a hair piece on her tail which is an accepted part of the showing trade to make the competitors look their very best.
This cow, who picked up the coveted Baileys Champion All-Ireland Dairy Cow championship for 2008, wore a sash identifying her as from Co Meath where, when she is not winning prizes, she provides milk to make the famous cream liqueur.
In an intense competition watched closely by over 2,000 people, the Welsh judge, Harry Evans, extolled the virtues of the 34 finalists to an enraptured audience.
The winner's joint owners, Richard Whelan and Arle Kelly from Towlagh, Clonard, Co Meath, were over the moon.
"When she is not being shown she is just another working dairy cow and its very hard to get the ball on the tail right so she is wearing a piece," said Mr Evans.
He has been breeding Holstien Friesian cattle since 1972 and when Lumville Danois 2 began winning he sold a half share to Arle who was at the show to pick the €2,000 first prize.
The championship is the top prize in the country and increases the value of a cow considerably.
Experts around the ring where the competition took place in brilliant sunshine estimated that the 34 cows who took part would conservatively be worth nearly half a million euro.
For the first time in 12 years, this was truly an all-Ireland event as cattle from the North were included after being excluded from travelling South since the BSE scare of the 1990s.
This 67th annual Virginia Show was attended by more than 20,000 people, doubling the attendance of last year. The event also benefited from the cancellation of the Tullamore Show a fortnight ago, because some of the classes were transferred here.
Of course, all eyes were on the skies. The weather prompted a statement from Ireland East MEP Mairead McGuinness, who was a special guest. She said building work on farms had ground to a halt because of poor weather and there was a need to extend grants for such work into the new year.
The IFA's National Dairy Committee chairman, Richard Kennedy, said there was a pressing case for co-ops in the northern and western parts of the country as the milk prices tended to be lower there.
"At a recent meeting, our local County Dairy Committee chairmen themselves identified the necessity for milk purchasers to co-operate more on areas such as farm milk collection, bulk milk transport and milk processing in particular," he said. He said the north and west accounted for 1.1 billion litres, or 20 per cent, of the national milk pool, which was collected by a dozen purchasers.
But back to cows again.
One disgruntled dairy farmer said the dairy cow of the future would probably have to have webbed feet to cope with the weather.