A cow will show you most of what you need to know if you check her in a sensible order and compare her with herself on a good day. The quick home check is not a substitute for veterinary examination, but it is how stockkeepers catch trouble while it is still small: appetite, rumination, breathing, condition and movement, read in a few unhurried minutes at feeding or milking time when the animal is already standing calmly for you.
Start at a distance, then the head
Before you touch her, watch the cow approach, stand and eat. She should be bright, interested in feed, and chewing cud in long, relaxed sweeps when resting, since a cow that has stopped ruminating is a cow whose system is unhappy about something. Look at her stance and gait for favouring a leg, an arched back, or reluctance to turn. At the head, healthy eyes are bright and clear without discharge gathering in the corners, ears flick normally at flies, and the muzzle is moist. A dry, cracked muzzle alone means little on a hot day, but combined with dullness and a dropped appetite it adds weight. Listen to breathing from the side: it should be quiet and regular, not laboured, noisy or accompanied by a cough at rest, and any frothing, drooling or difficulty swallowing is a same-day conversation with your veterinarian.
Body, udder, legs and what comes out
Run your eye and, where safe, your hand along the body. The coat should lie reasonably smooth for the season without bald patches, lumps, swellings or an unusual number of parasites visible at the neck and tail head. Feel the spine and ribs to judge condition against last month rather than against the fattest cow in the herd. Check the udder in a dairy or suckling cow for evenness, heat, swelling or a quarter that feels different from the others, and look at the teats for cuts and sores. Watch her urinate and pass manure if you can; the manure's consistency tells you about the diet and gut, and a cow straining, passing blood, or producing nothing is a finding, not a detail. Finally, look at the feet and legs for swelling above the hoof, heat, cracks or an overgrown claw that is changing how she stands.
Add one more comparison that takes seconds: check the cow against her herdmates at the same moment. A single cow breathing a little faster on a hot afternoon means one thing; the only cow in a resting group that is not chewing cud, not flicking at flies and not shifting position means something else entirely. Herd context is the experienced stockkeeper's shortcut, because it filters out weather, feed changes and time of day, leaving the individual animal's deviation standing clearly on its own. Record that deviation while you can still see it, rather than reconstructing it later from memory.
Recording the check so it means something later
Contact your veterinarian the same day about a cow that is off her feed and not cudding, breathing with effort, down and unable or unwilling to rise, badly lame, or showing a swollen, hot quarter of the udder, and treat a down cow that cannot rise as urgent. Otherwise, the check pays off through notes: what her appetite, cud and condition were like today becomes next month's comparison. Keeping those dated observations in KinsLe in the Pet Passport, with her other records, means the vet starts from facts, not impressions.