The Agitated Cow

So, let's pretend your a cow.  A 1400 lb heifer to be exact.  Let's say you are currently pregnant and your due date has come and gone.  Instead of being in a calm, serene field of beautiful green grass where you can rest lazily under a tree until your little one decides to be born, you're at a hot, dirty state fair where the temps are reaching high 90s and low hundreds surrounded by too many people with sticky fingers, stinky smells and nothing better to do than to poke at you.  All this while an 80-100 lbs calf kicks and punches at you with it's hooves.  What kind of mood would you be in?

I can tell you that 111 days away from my due date, with a baby that weighs under 2 lbs growing inside of me that kicks and punches, the fair isn't exactly the most fun place in the world for me to be at.  And if people were constantly petting me, I would probably want to kick them in the face.  I can relate to that poor, uncomfortable cow.

Yesterday morning, the UC Davis vets were transporting a very pregnant heifer into her pen at the CA State Fair so that farm goers everywhere can watch her be stuck in a contraption and give birth amidst hoots, hollers and gasps.  They created a tunnel that lead from her truck into the pen.  Somehow, she got out.

Of course, this happened 2 hours or so before the vet was about to open.  She was miserable and had no desire to get in the pen, can you blame her?  She just plain and simply wouldn't cooperate.  So, the vet went and grabbed a tranquilizer gun.  Evidently, the only one the fair had despite the fact that they had dozens of wild animals at the fair, in the Farm where kids like to go.  The gun didn't work.  Oh no.  Whatever could they do?  I mean, we can't keep people waiting to get into the fair with a hugely pregnant cow on the loose in the farm area!

And then a light bulb went off and they had a solution: Let's ask the police officer to unload his weapon into the stomach of the cow several times to stop and kill it and the unborn calf.

Yes, that's a good plan.

And that's just what they did.  They had no desire to wait it out, to allow the cow to calm down and get into a position where she would be safe as would the farm goers.  They shot it.  They shot an innocent cow and her unborn calf because she wasn't ready for her birth to be a source of entertainment. 

Isn't that just lovely.