05/11/2025
Call me the "cow whisperer" 🐂
Home always shows me something and this morning was no exception.
We had a very young calf who had somehow managed to end up on the outside of our very secure boundary fence. Fortunately we have some eagle eyed neighbours and bus driver who spied it and had let me know
Young calves are often left in tall grass to wait Mums return. But she hadn't because she couldn't. This calf was lost, waiting for mum to come back to nourish and protect her but she wasn't anywhere around so this vulnerable calf was left to perish.
So when I caught it this morning I had a number of options.
1) take it home and feed it. It would become a pet who would eventually assimilate back into the herd, albeit a bit of an outsider and if our first pet calf is anything to go by, a pain in the butt not wanting go through the yards and often just getting in the way, hence her nickname "pothole" (always in the road)
2) place it next to the trough and hope mum finds it when she comes in for a drink and double hope it doesn't die in the meantime
3) take some time, use my intimate knowledge and experience with livestock, and figure out which cow was mum.
I went with option 3.
It helped there was just 2 cows left in the paddock after the rest had moved into another paddock. One cow had a calf, the other was sticking close to her and her calf which isn't unusal, but it also made me stop and pay attention. They were nowhere near the lost calf but I trusted my gut and decided she was possibly mum (her udder wasn't obvious so it made this a little harder too). I placed the calf on the ground and then brought the 2 cows and calf to her. Gently coaxing them, asking for a bit of divine intervention and then it just came down to my patience. Once they caught up the cow pushed her away initially but then realised it was her calf. If I had been impatient, hurried or not trusting of myself it could have been a completely different outcome.
And as I sat and waited for the calf to feed, it reminded me of us. When we feel lost or abandoned or unsure of what to do next we must always remember we have options and that sometimes we need someone else to be patient, compassionate, knowledgeable and intuitive so we can come back to a nurturing and safe space within ourself and for some people that person is me.
Needless to say the calf now has a full belly and I have a full heart.
Photo 📸 not the actual cows and calves but one of my "Tula" AKA pothole. She is the one standing in the gate way 🙄
