Life as December Goat: Day 4
14One of the highlights of living in the country is when a neighbor contacts you to say that they think one of your cows is out. This is especially troublesome when the husband is at work and you have to first determine if the cow is out, then how to get the cow back in if it is indeed out, and finally you have to play detective to know how the cow got out. Thankfully, today’s episode did not turn out to have a cow actually out and it must have just been in a weird place across the creek to make the neighbor think he had escaped. I went over with a bucket of feed and all three were where they were supposed to be.
I then had to walk the fence anyway just to be certain there wasn’t a down place. I first tried to walk the fence inside the pasture as Hubbie assured me the cows would be too busy eating if I fed them feed and kicked up their hay for them. The three male cows had other thoughts on the matter and took turns trying to charge toward me. I always carry a bo staff with me when I do have to go in the field so I was able to keep them at bay until I could exit the field. I then had to walk the fence from outside the pasture which takes three times as long because I have to enter two other neighbors’ fields to reach our fence line.
I found no place where it looked like a cow had escaped so I hope that it was just an optical illusion and they stay put.
Do any of you have livestock to keep you on your toes?
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Here are the three idiot cows still trying to figure out how to get to me when I was in the neighbor’s field.
@tnhillbillygal they look very sweet, gal. Do you guys eat them, milk them, or just have them around for kicks? Do they have names? They look very clean, too.
@moonhat It’s a little difficult to milk bulls/steer
@moonhat We raise them for beef. We will be taking one off next month and my one is my brother’s that will be taken off at the same time. Their names are Burrito, Taco, and Ushi.
@moonhat @tnhillbillygal Why not Angus for beef? My farming uncle used to swear by them. They’re just as aggressive, though.
@moonhat @OldCatLady We just get holsteins because they are easily available and cheap from dairy farms nearby. These three we bought from another farm that gets them directly from the dairy and raises them until they are weaned. We have bottle fed calves but we decided it was worth the extra money to have them already weaned before we brought them to our farm.
@moonhat @tnhillbillygal My cousins go even further. They buy a nice half steer every so often, and I’m sending them a nice sous vide for Christmas.
No livestock here. I’m not Alf, so my neighbor’s cat doesn’t count.
The next city over, there are still some dairy farms, but those are slowly getting sold for $$$$ because of land values here in SoCal.
I live a couple of blocks off of Route 66, so there’s some wildlife and commerce happening up at the little No-Tell Motel on the corner. There might be some filly’s, but no livestock exactly.
My mom has 3 old maids left. Before my step dad got ill they had around 130. He was in no condition to continue taking care of them, so the cows were sold off to neighbors of varying distance from mom’s farm. For a couple years, several of them kept making their way back to her place. She would check their tags and call the corresponding neighbor to come collect their cows.
In her area of Tennessee there are a few guys who run recovery services to locate and collect escaped livestock. Apparently it’s a fairly active side business.
Disappointed. No goats in story.
@PocketBrain We used to have goats. They didn’t like to stay in their fence though. We had the bright idea we were going to raise dairy goats but that lasted about a year and we determined goats were not the livestock for us.
@PocketBrain The storyteller is the goat. Duh.
/giphy goat brain
I don’t. Friends do. But, one of my friends was checking her cows and they charged and broke both her legs recently. Fun is! (But I guess that would be your fault now, wouldn’t it?!)
Oh… there have been a few times when I woke up to find about 10-15 head of cattle on my patio. Even tho I lived in the forest, the next property behind us had a lot of cattle and sometimes they’d knock that fence down and come on our land and right up to the house (the only clear spot) foraging for the acorns that were abundant. But I guess that’s also your fault!
My neighbor has Scottish Highland cattle (the shaggy kind where both cows and bulls have long pointy horns) and they escape their pasture pretty regularly. I don’t care much if they poke around down in our woods, but I’m not happy when they come up around the house (and garden and orchard).
My wife grew up on a farm in South Dakota and has no fear of cattle. I do get a little nervous when I’m away and she shoos the big bull away with a stick. (Similar to this guy, but all black)
@therealjrn That, +
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