I have extra straw under the side roof of the barn. It is protected by a metal gate and a long wooden pallet tied together around a post. Yesterday Buddy pushed one end of the metal gate up to eat some straw. Beulah broke the top board of the wooden pallet to eat straw. Since they weren't standing and going to the bathroom on the straw I let them be. Cattle don't usually eat straw but occasionally they do to get some roughage.
Today I checked. The metal gate was laying flat on the ground with straw completely covering it. The wooden pallet was mostly broken and half laying in the mud and straw. Four cattle were standing as far up on the straw as they could squeeze under the barn roof. The straw was a mess.
I chased the cows away and dug out the metal gate and stood it up. I wrapped barb wire around the gate and the post. In the other end I pounded a metal t-post through part of the gate and into the ground.
I got three long boards and blocked the wooden pallet side. The cattle could get their head through the boards but could no longer climb up on the straw.
Later in the afternoon after the cattle left the corral I closed the gates. I dug the broken pallet out of the straw and mud and removed it from the corral. The cattle wanted back into the corral. So I took some of the straw and put it into the long wooden feeder.
First I had to fix the feeder's floor. With all the rain the boards swelled up and in two places sides of the boards popped up. I replaced one 2x4 board with a 2x2 board. For the other spot I had to cut an inch and a half off the board so it would fit flat.
I let the cattle back into the corral. Now that the straw wasn't in a place where they weren't suppose to go they weren't as interested in it.
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