During a field day recently, it seemed like cows were everywhere. We spent most of the day at one site, and were greeted by a herd of cattle when we pulled up. One, however, didn’t seem ecstatic that we were here.
He stood his ground until he couldn’t stand it anymore, and finally walked off very slowly, but only after Scott approached him.
Once we finished with the plot, we drove off to check out a couple more sites we hadn’t checked on yet since our arrival. I was happy to see more cows in this area, happily grazing in our study plots. This is a good thing, because half of the study plots are supposed to be grazed.
The other half of the study plots are located inside fence exclosures so they are left to recover from grazing. At our last site, however, we found this lonely guy stuck inside the exclosure.
He has plenty of food and plenty of space, but these areas should be “ungrazed” so it’s really not ideal to have a cow stuck inside. I’m not sure exactly how he got in – but I’m sure Juliana will love my request to try and remove the cow from our study site. J
Luckily, one cow apparently doesn’t do a huge amount of damage. Most of our plot area appeared to be fine, but a little more trampled than it should have been. Oh, well. Hopefully we can get him out of there and he can return to his herd soon.
Ahh, poor little fella. How substantial are the fences you have for the exclosures? Hopefully this will be the only one you have invading your site!
ReplyDeleteThey are just like the regular fences that USUALLY keep all the livestock out. I'm guessing that part of it may have come down during a storm, or perhaps he just squeezed through (he's pretty young) if the fence was bent during a storm. The fence looks totally fine now, and he seems a little perplexed. I think he was hoping we'd let him out, but we don't exactly have the ability or skill to open the fence and make the repairs once we let him out.
ReplyDeleteScott needs to get a cape to go with his vest.
ReplyDeleteI don't think the headless cow in the therd pic will have much effect on your site, but it does look just as tasty as the others.
ReplyDelete