Supplemental data for: “Dear Calf” - Farmers’ narratives of calf care in dairy and beef systems using letter writing

This dataset contains the supplementary materials of the following study: Human-livestock relationships are shaped by a complex interplay between farmers’ emotional bonds with animals and the practical demands of farming. This study used a letter-writing approach to explore how cattle farmers make sense of this tension in relation to calf care. Beef farmers (n=14) and dairy farmers (n=15), from Brazil, Ireland, Canada, and the United Kingdom, wrote letters addressed to a calf raised on their farm, describing and explaining what the calf would experience from birth to weaning. The thematic narrative analysis of the letters (n=29) resulted in three main themes: 1) Lived experiences (farmers structured their narratives around key life events experienced by the calf, including postnatal care, health management, painful procedures, and life transitions); 2) Calf's perspective (farmers considered how the calf would experience those events, including the roles calves were expected to occupy, the emotions they might experience, how their needs would be addressed, and the relationships they would form with other individuals); 3) Farmer's care (farmers positioned themselves as caregivers responsible for calves’ health, welfare, and development). Farmers’ accounts of calf care extended beyond descriptions of management practices to include moral and relational narratives about responsibility, necessity, and care. This study demonstrates the value of narrative methods for examining moral reasoning in human-animal relationships. More broadly, the findings suggest that animal welfare discussions may benefit from recognising farmers as caregivers working within systemic conditions that can shape, and sometimes constrain, their ability to protect calf welfare.