Cattle Whisperer....Only Louder

Shamelessly stolen from Liz's FB page

 Liz's cow, Dalkeith, had a nice red heifer calf Saturday. Big surprise as there was only a one in four chance of getting red. She is a cute one.

However, big, gentle, good-natured old Dal decided that the barn was a trap with dragons inside and she wasn't ever going back in there. Mind you, she has been going in and standing in the second stall for three of her five years....

She wouldn't even follow her baby inside. 

Heaven knows we tried to get her to go in. She escaped to pasture. She climbed a manure pile. She ran through people like they were bowling pins and she was looking for a strike. 

We parked the skid steer next to the door to cut off one avenue of escape. Didn't help. We did everything we could think of. You really can't make a cow do anything if they don't want to. Dal is much bigger than all of us combined. If she don't wanna, she ain't gonna.

Then I remembered something that has worked in the past. As she tried yet again to dodge like a cutting horse and duck away from the door, I hollered at her.

Loud. I offered a fate worse than death. Sesame seed buns with pickles. And other choice scenarios. I guess she got the message.

Because she ducked her head, trotted in through the door, and went to her stall. The experts say to be quiet when handling cattle and as a general rule we are. It just works better to keep them calm and cooperative. However, Dal wasn't scared of us. She had just taken a notion. And like a naughty kid that won't listen to mom and dad, well, sometimes you just have to raise your voice.

We will sure be keeping her inside until she settles down a bit. That's where her new baby is anyhow.