A tale of cockleburrs and a cow's tail

Cockleburrs (or burdock) with their loops and hooks inspired the Frenchman to invent velcro, and that's a good thing, but being swatted in he face by a cow's tail  full of cockleburrs is a bad thing. Take it from me, who had that experience often while milking.  Cockleburrs didn't grow in the pasture but they loved soybean fields and came into their own in the fall.  While foraging in the fields the cows would gather the burrs in their tails and bring them in when coming to be milked.

I can still remember as if it was last week that the cow I was milking had an especially heavey  load of cockleburrs in her tail, which she kept swinging at my face.  Finally I couldn;t take it any more; I separated the hairs of her tail and tied it to her right hind leg.  I milked her in safety for a few minutes but then whap--she had jerked her tail free and gave me the hardest blow I had ever received.  I recovered enough to finish milking despite a bruised and scratched face. At the time I had never seen or heard of velcro.