Get Along, Little Doggie

My grandfather had two farms. One was down Old Russellville Pike where he kept pigs and grew a little tobacco and hay. He had cattle too—a nice herd of Herefords, that stocky, breed of beef cattle with the red coat and white face—that stayed there part of the year and in the field behind our house for the other part of the year.

That meant that twice a year, we’d have the Great Cattle Drive, when we’d all come together—well, those of us old enough—to keep the cattle on the road from Farm One to Farm Two. It wasn’t a very long drive, maybe a mile total, and not even a particularly big one, with only about 30-40 head or so involved, but it was quite the sight, particularly when they got to the rather busy highway and had to briefly stop traffic while the slow moving beasts made their way up Depot Street.

The highway was the hardest part. Old houses sat on two of the four corners, one up a little incline and the other very close to both street and highway. But the other two corners boasted businesses. One was my dad’s garage, relatively close to the highway but still a tad further back than the small house across the street.

The other corner was what passed for a strip mall in tiny Russellville, and by that I mean there were two businesses in the low brick building—the post office and a grocery. With a parking lot, which naturally attracted the curiosity of one or two bovines who would inevitably start meandering toward the IGA.

Oddly enough, this was good news, because just after crossing the highway, the herd had to make a sharp right turn into our yard then head around back of the house and through the gate into the field. If a few cattle went broad left into the parking lot, it was just that much easier to guide them toward that narrow strip of green green grass that scooted around the house. And cattle, being herd animals, well, they’d do what herd animals always do and follow the herd.

If you thought that would be the end of it, well, you’d be thinking wrong, because there’s always some cow or another, usually a young one, who thinks fences are for crossing. We used a 13 gauge double strand barbed wire, usually four spans, and I’m pretty sure a few of those head of cattle spent a great deal of time casually munching on grass below the fence while discreetly loosening the spans and stretching them so that escape would be possible.

And sure enough, eventually there’d be that call from a neighbor. “Looks like one a your cows is out.”

Moving a herd of cattle is one thing. Convincing a single freedom-minded calf to go back through the gate is another thing altogether. They’re fast. Real fast. And I’m pretty sure they think it’s just a game, darting toward the spaces between the silly humans trying to close those gaps and head the wayward child back into the field with the rest, who were inevitably lined along the fence to watch the fun while mama mooed softly from the back, urging the little miscreant to come on back.

I’m not convinced we ever won those games. I think eventually the little fella just got tired, or hungry, maybe even bored, and decided to go back of his or her own accord.

I used to play in the fields, even if the cattle were there, always keeping an eye out for the bull, who was never aggressive but always watchful. He took his job seriously, I could tell. They built excellent paths on some of the steeper areas, making my own games of exploration just a little easier. We did have to watch for cow pies, because that was something they were never discreet about.

The cattle came over to the field behind our house in the spring, so they’d go back the other way come fall, after the hay was all put up and the tobacco sold, before winter set in. I could hear them from the yard, their hooved feet shuffling along the concrete until they turned the corner and their gentle lowing faded away.