Another trap missing

*Argh!* Those darn cattle! A few days ago I had added a short fence along the river and still 11 of them decided to river walk.

I saw them in the middle pasture last evening and decided to leave them be for the time being as I seen they had already knocked over the marking sticks for the pocket gopher traps. I figured there was no harm in them being in the middle pasture and I'd let them get it out of their system over night. Either they would do a river walk back to the south pasture else get "separation anxiety" being apart from the rest of the herd and not being able to go out into the hayfield.

Late this morning the herd was in the NE part of the south pasture and the "gang of 11" was across the fence in the SE part of the middle pasture. I gathered up some bread and small apples that had fallen from my trees. I fed them to the cattle in the south pasture while the "gang of 11" watched from the middle pasture.

"See what you're missing?!"

One of Dan's cattle let me scratch its head. That was a first as cattle like to sniff and lick me but don't like to be touched.

While one heifer stuck her head in the bucket to get more apples I went over to open the gate to the three cattle now standing at the gate. One entered and the other two stood there. The rest of the 11 stood and watched from the shade of the large pine tree in the corner.

"You idiots!"

I moved down the fence line to the west and with my long legs stepped over. One heifer was standing in the shade of a pine tree and I "shushed" her along. She went over to the remainder of the herd standing under the corner's very large pine tree.

"Come on girls. The herd and block licks are over there. The gate is open and I am here. Put two and two together."

I had to walk around and encourage them to cross the gate.

Of the 11, nine were my cattle. No wonder they weren't all hot and bothered to rejoin the main herd.

After getting all the cattle together in the south pasture I worked on adding to my fence along the river. Earlier I didn't want to extend the fence further north as this area was one of the minimal banks areas where the ground gradually enters the water. I want to keep as many of these areas open as possible as I don't want to restrict the cattle to one or two areas. Over use is where bank damage can occur. I have avoided that. But the cattle are not in the middle pasture so closing this access temporarily shouldn't cause problems elsewhere. It just means more fence work right now.

About the time I finished extending the fence to a deep water / steep bank area half the herd showed up to drink some water. I sat in the shade under a tree to watch. The south/middle fence is just above where the east channel splits from the main channel. Earlier I had built a fence from the south/middle fence and blocked river access until a short distance into the east channel. Watching the cattle they entered the river along the east channel and then walked up to the main channel to drink.

"What? The water is just as good in the east channel!"

Go figure. The cattle all know I was watching them so they returned to the south pasture without making a move to try to reach the middle pasture. Else these were the "good cattle" who had earlier remained in the south pasture. The all black cattle blend together and I hadn't memorized ear tags when herding them earlier back into the south pasture. I had wanted to see their reaction when they found the fence now *should* go farther than they would want to go as it means they would have to swim.

As of tonight all are in the hayfield and south pasture.

I had to go around and put all the marking sticks back up. I also had to reset all the traps as they had triggered them. Most of the milk jugs were separated from the marking sticks and a number of the jugs and sticks were scattered a distance from the traps. The iron bars marking the gopher traps were leaning and several were knocked completely over. Then I discovered one conibear trap was missing! It's steel rod had been pulled out of the ground allowing a hawk or eagle to fly off with the gopher and trap. All the remaining traps were empty.

I was so mad that if the cattle were still in the middle pasture and I had a switch I would have tanned their hide. If I could have hooked up an electrical charge to those marking sticks to give the cattle a jolt I would have gladly done so.

Why? Why are they so obsessed with knocking over the sticks and rods and taking everything apart?! Why can't they be satisfied with eating the grass and chewing their cud?

The time spent building the fence didn't allow me to finish watering my garden. It is so dry now the garden and fruit trees needs lots of water. And I could have been doing other chores that need to be done. *sigh*