Cow Vs. Dog
It was late afternoon on a Wednesday when the neighbor’s cow appeared in the garden. I was finishing up some work on a new cart design that Michael had left me with. Michael was out of town visiting relatives, so he had trusted me to look after some things while he was gone. As I was walking from the workshop towards the house, I noticed something that was not quite kosher in the distance. Quickly realizing that the neighbor’s cow was on the wrong side of the fence and was devouring the corn plants, I sprinted towards the cow shouting and and waving my arms wildly. The cow rolled its huge eyes in my direction and glared, but its mouth went right on chewing.
It was at this moment I realized that I hadn’t the slightest clue of how to herd a cow.
Since the shouting and arm flailing was little more than amusement to the 1800-pound beast of modern nature, I tried throwing a clump of dirt at her. This got her attention, but only made her angry and nervous. I quickly learned that a nervous and angry cow in a delicate field of corn, tomatoes, and squash plants is a little like Godzilla in New York City. To my utter dismay, the cow bucked and pranced and munched and mooed its way across the entire east end of the farm. As the cow stomped down the rows of baby zucchini plants, chomping them out of the ground one by one, its cow friends ran along with her on the other side of the electric fence, wanting to be a part of the action. Even Suma, the farm dog, stopped chasing his shadow for a moment to watch the drama unfold.
Suma timidly put his nose up to the cow attempting a peace treaty, but the cow rejected him with a grunt and swung its neck the other away.
After nearly half-an-hour of coaxing the cow with a bucket of grain, poking it with the end of a shovel, and probably making the situation worse rather than better, we managed to get ahold of the neighbors and corral the big girl home. In the end it wasn’t the most ideal thing to happen during my first few weeks on the job, but exciting none the less. The trampled beds can be reformed and the plants will grow back in time, but the cows will laugh about this day forever.