Community Chat

[Kachina624]

Both cattle horses have big heavy, boney heads.  When your head is close to their, then can throw their heads suddenly and crash into yours.  Hurts like heck...I know from experience.  If the animal is a big bull, it could easily cause a fracture.

[Nonametoday]

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@Icegoddess wrote:

In general, cows are perfectly fine.  Just look at the reasons given for when they become dangerous.  The policemen trying to corral or encourage the cow to go home stresses it.  Most wild animals are fiercely protective of their young.  

There are some breeds that are meaner than others.  Black Angus are particularly difficult.  

My grandparents' milk cows really couldn't care less that I was walking through the pasture from the barn to the house.  I was afraid of them, but there was no need to be if I left them alone to their grazing.  

Watch some Dr. Pol and see how dangerous they can become when stressed.  

I thought everybody knew bulls were dangerous.  

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@Icegoddess 

Raised on a farm and we had both bulls and milk cows.  The cows did not like me but they loved my grandmother and my brother, but not my sister.  Not sure why but my grandmother said it was because I was too rough when I was milking them and did not have the technique.  Sister didn't care to learn the technique. 

I once was traveling through a country highway to get my mother when her car had quit.  I was on a VW.  I had a 10-day-old baby with me.  Guess who was meeting me?  About 15-20 cows that had gotten out from their fenced farm.  I just said still, praying, praying hard.  The cows chose to run toward the grassy area beside the highway and on down the highway and I went for my mother.  When we returned to that area, state troopers were corraling them and they were being put into a cattle carrier.

We had a very docile chow.  The most gentle dog we ever had.  She got out of our 8-ft wood fence once when a storm was coming. I had no idea there was a storm coming. I left her outside.  She WOULD NOT go inside the house. So we always put her in the screen porch where she could come and go. She could bump the door open with her head and run and play, potty.

I returned home from about 25 miles, a doctor visit.  Within 2 miles of my home on a Friday afternoon, was a traffic light and all traffic was stopped and there were several police cars and they were trying to corral my dog.  She had gotten out, out of fear of the storm which was just a 10-minute T&L storm. I asked them to please leave her alone and not harm her as she was gentle but she had become "wild and fearful." Once they let me get her, everyone, about 200-300 people who were trying to chase her, stood down, she came to me, got into the car with me and we went home.  She was angry out of fear.  She was willing to bite or whatever she needed to do because she was afraid.

[Bookplate]

This is why I rarely leave the city; it's a jungle out there!

[gardenman]

I went to school with a kid who grew up on a dairy farm. He used to joke that any vegetarian who had to work with cows every day would soon decide that killing them and eating them wasn't such a bad idea. Some can be very docile, but some are mean and will try to knock you down, step on your feet, kick you, slap you with a urine or feces-soaked tail, etc. People have an illusion of cows being peaceful, serene creatures. Uh, not all of them. Some can be quite vicious and aggressive. 

[Sooner]

@gardenman Oh tell me about it!  I raised a number of new-born calves on bottles for months after their mamas either died or rejected the calves or once a twin that was rejected. I have herded them, fed them, roped them, helped fence them in, and driven trailers full of them.  

Once on a moonlight night I had to help herd several big steers back in a barn after they escaped into a small pasture where my dad was afraid they would run through a barbed wire fence.  Ever "shooed" big running, scared, big steers back in a barn at night?  My dad kept saying "they don't want to run over you. . .  

Cattle are odd.  Nothing like dogs or horses.  And they are certainly massive animals up close, and they kick you, will swing their huge head at you, or butt you and you are down for the count.  They are not as smart or intuitive or I guess "aware" of humans either as dogs and cats.  

Their feet are massive and their hooves big, hard and sharp.  Get kicked and you have a bruise to remember.

Ours were well fed and sheltered and treated to a life of cow luxury, and we loved them, laughed at them and enjoyed the ranching business (we were small potatoes, only about 100 of them), but you don't let your guard down around any large cows or horses like that.  And if mama is around, be very careful around the baby. 

[chrystaltree]

Well, imagine that.  An animal that weighs a  thousand pounds and has hoofs and is  frightened  or agitated can be dangerous.  I live in a suburban area.  Not near any farms or dairies.  There are patches of undeveloped land.  So...  Last fall, the town was getting reports of cow in the land near a strip mall.  Right off the highway.  The police looked, never found a cow but the calls kept coming in.  It didn't make sense until the cow made it's presence know.  It had been weeks since the first sighting.  Animal control came and got the cow and took it to a farm.  Even though the area the cow was on was small, there was plenty of grass and they said pools of water so the cow was very healthy.   But no one knows where it came from or how it got there.  No one ever reported a missing cow or a cow walking down the highway.  Some think it was a pet cow that someone kept in their yard and when it got too big, they dumped in that land behind the strip mall.  

[GoneButNotForgotten]

Dr. Pol has plenty to say about cattle; so does Laura Ingalls Wilder.

[Jacie]

Ranching and farming are fraught with danger. Accidents can be regular occurrences.

I have family who run a huge cattle, horse and outfitting ranch in Colorado. I have certainly wrangled my fair share of cows. Cowboys are tough for a reason, you never know what is going to happen. One family member has had his share of injuries, it goes with the territory. In large part because the running of a ranch is a fast paced life that can place one in peril.

Horses and cows can be tricky! A dangerous life that is so rewarding.

[RedTop]

Don't ever try cow tipping!  I know what Google says about the subject, but I was in on an attempt as the gate keeper.  I didn't see what went on in the field other than the boys trying to outrun a cow and a bull!