Cattle into neighbor's field

This morning I let my cattle into the field of one of my neighbors to the south.  Off and on over the years when the neighbors/renters did not have horses in this field  I let my cattle into the field as the neighbors/renters did not want tall and dry grass; though I never let my cattle into this field this late in the season.  This year, no horses, and a new owner of the field.

Earlier this year the new owner asked if I would cut the field for hay; but it wasn't worth doing so.  I offered to have my cattle eat the grass down for her.  But first the field needed to be sprayed for weeds by the county as the transmission lines go over the field. We're not sure if the county ever did so.  Then the fence along the road needed to be fixed.  Late Spring someone drove off the road and took out two of the fence posts.  No one had ever fixed the fence since then.

Since my pastures are getting eaten down pretty good; and I want to wait a little longer before I let the cattle into the hayfield; it was up to me to fix her fence if I wanted cattle in this field.  I could have placed a couple of corral panels temporarily to block the broken fence but I figured it wouldn't take me too long to fix the fence.  Of course it took me a little longer than expected, but that is the way it seems to be these days.  The person who originally had built the fence went for overkill so it took a lot longer to just take the broken fence apart so that I could rebuild it after putting two posts into the ground.

To let the cattle to go from my field to her field I have two gates in my fences near one another.  I still had to bring a short metal gate to chain and bungee cord to the two gates as the two gates didn't quite reach each other.

It was after 11 am when I carried the metal gate across the hayfield.  Even though it is dry out here, the hayfield grass was very wet. From dew?  Was dew that heavy last night?  My thick shoes got soaked, and so did the socks I was wearing in my shoes.

While carrying the metal gate I came across a very large area of pocket gophers mounds in the hayfield. A gopher moved into the hayfield once again.  By late afternoon I had trapped the pocket gopher.  Since the cattle will mostly be in the neighbor's field I then placed the trap back into the south pasture to get that pocket gopher who is still making fresh mounds of dirt.

The cattle had been resting in the middle pasture, but when they saw me in the hayfield setting the pocket gopher trap, they came to the hayfield fence as they thought I was going to let them into the hayfield.  So I called them into the south pasture and opened the gates to the neighbor's field.  As you can see below, #8 was confused.  She wouldn't come through the gates.  It wasn't until Little Red and Sugar and the other cows came through did #8 come through the open gate.

Little Red leading the way

Sugar

Panda complaining the neighbor's grass was on the dry side.

Diamond

Red

Beulah

The cattle went around the neighbor's field.  They ran over to the far corner and stood and stared at another neighbor's field.  Eventually they started walking around again checking things out.  Panda went back to my gates and stood and looked at my hayfield and mooed and mooed.  She wanted me to come over and let her into the hayfield.  Nope.   Later she went over to the other gate mid-field and looked at the hayfield and mooed.  Nope.  Not opening that gate either.

I must admit, the grass is definitely greener in my hayfield.

Now to see how long the cattle will eat the grass in the neighbor's field.  It may not be as green, but it is edible.

Here is a 1 minute 53 video of the cattle going from my field to the neighbor's field: https://youtu.be/nKo3tBlx9SE