Keith Bertrand hasn’t milked a cow in a long time, but he was up to the challenge at Thursday’s Dairy Fun Night.

It was a competition that pitted professor against professor – and in Bertrand’s case, husband against wife.

“It’s like a professional competing against a semi-pro,” he said Thursday.

Bertrand, the animal and dairy science department head, was raised on a beef farm. His wife, Jean, the associate dean of academics in the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, was raised on a dairy farm, and therefore had the upper hand in the professor milking competition.

Katie Williams, a junior from Madison, is the president of the Dairy Science Club, the organization that puts on Dairy Fun Night each year. She said usually about 20 teams sign up, and combined with professors and spectators, attendance runs close to 100 people.

Four-person teams competed at the Instructional Arena on South Milledge in the rest of the evening’s contests – heifer costume, heifer race, ice cream eating, milk chugging, cheese race and a hay bale toss.

“The craziest costume I have ever seen is a heifer dressed up as a Christmas tree along with presents underneath,” said Jesse Patrick, a senior from Eatonton and Dairy Fun Night chairman.

“My favorite event is the ice-cream eating contest,” he told The Red & Black Wednesday. “The contestants have to get on their knees and put their hands behind their backs. Then another member of their team has to feed them the ice cream, and the one who eats the fastest wins.”

The milk-chugging contest follows a similar set-up, where one student gets on his knees and chugs milk from a baby bottle.

Another popular favorite competition is the heifer race.

“Two students are involved, one at the front end pulling on the halter and one at the rear of the animal pushing on the animal’s rump,” Mark Froetschel, a professor in the animal and dairy science department, told The Red & Black Wednesday.

Froetschel and fellow professor Bill Graves co-advise the club.

“The team members who get their heifer to travel the distance of the arena and go around a barrel and back across the starting line again first receives a higher score,” he said.

Froetschel said though all the heifers – or “teenage female cattle” – are halter-broken, it takes skill to manipulate the “gas and brake pedals” on a bovine.

Patrick said heifers are switched out between the two events they’re involved in so as not to stress them out.

Froestschel also said he liked the hay bale toss event.

“You get these guys who think they’re so strong, and they’re not always the ones who win,” he said.

Joey Nunez, a sophomore from Trenton, was asked to join an all-female team for that purpose, despite being a first-time participant in Dairy Fun Night.

Some female participants, such as Alicia Lipsey, a senior from Statesboro, begged to differ.

“Girls can throw hay bales too,” she said.

Lafe Perkins and Douglas Harrell, both graduate students from Whigham, were part of team “The Fox.” As Dairy Fun Night veterans, they said they weren’t going to let anyone beat them this year.

“We’ve been here for three years and we’re back with a vengeance,” Perkins said.

Though friendly competition and the offer of class extra credit were major drawing points for participants, the true purpose of Dairy Fun Night was to raise awareness about Georgia’s dairy industry.

“The inspiration for Dairy Fun Night was to enlighten people on the simple aspects of the dairy industry through dairy related events,” Patrick said.

It’s reason enough for Harrell and Perkins.

“We’re also here to support agriculture,” Harrell said.