Jailbreak number 2

Here is a writeup I just finished of a cattle jailbreak back from when I still had the cattle in the corral and was feeding them hay...

A few Saturday mornings ago I got up at 8 am to get a drink of water, and looking out my kitchen window I saw my whole cattle herd in my backyard busy munching on the grass!

(This photo is when I later let them in the yard, but the cattle's location is exactly the same.)

I got some clothes on, raced out the front door and down to the road and closed the gate there so the cattle could not get onto the road.

The cattle had not gotten past the house so I slowly herded them back to behind the blue building. They were very excited to be out of the corral. I let them eat the grass there for a while. "Notch" - who I am thinking of now calling "Boss Lady" - pushed over the stack of straw bales and then began rubbing her face in the bales, breaking some of the bales. It was like catnip to her I guess. I shooed her away.

When the cattle weren't near the line from the straw bales to the corner of the blue building I lined up the straw bales to mark a line past where the cattle wouldn't go. Naturally some of the cattle wanted to go past the bales. Among them Pink and Boss Lady. Emily also was getting in the action.

Even with all the easy grass to eat a few cattle were getting on their knees to get their head on the ground to eat the grass growing under some wood piles. Other cattle would go in the pole shed and along the pickup. No grass in there! They would have to back up as they barely could squeeze in there in the first place.

Then with grass available four or five cattle decided they wanted to eat the hay bales. At least they didn't knock that stack over but they tore up a few bales.

Finally I got them back into the corral. *whew*

How they got out if the corral is that they broke the small walking gate next to the silver water trough. While I had placed wire on the corral fence I hadn't placed any wire on the gate I had built as I thought the openings were too small. I think one of them got her head through one of the gate's openings and when she couldn't easily get her head back out she pulled the gate off its hinges. The metal latch was also bent.

I had boards nailed holding the latch post to the corral fence post and all the boards were split in two.

I put in a new latch post which is more solid than the original post. I redid the latch so it is easy for me to open. I put wire over the opening in the gate. I had thought the opening for me to open the latch was ok to leave open until I saw a heifer try to get her head through it. I partially closed that opening and they now can only get their nose through the opening.

Here is an example of how they get their head through the corral posts.