Ned Mantei wrote:
On 30-10-18 07:58, James wrote:
On 30/10/18 11:39 am, Frank Krygowski wrote:


When my wife, daughter and I did our coast-to-coast ride, we were on a
gravel road in North Dakota when a woman driving a pickup truck
stopped us. She explained that another pair of touring cyclists just
ahead of us had spooked her cattle so badly they stampeded right
through a barbed wire fence and up the road.

Her family was herding the cows back down the gravel road, opposite
the direction we were riding. She asked us to please hide ourselves
behind some huge hay rolls in the adjacent pasture until they had
passed by.

So we took a snack break there, and after a while got to watch cowboys
on horses plus another pickup truck move the herd.

At least we didn't have to disassemble our bikes.* :-)


Yes, I've been asked to wait for cattle being driven along the road
reserve.* Some horses are particularly skittish around bicycles too.

It's the owners' fault, they should themselves have used cycles (including
recumbents) early on to teach their animals that bicycles aren't predators!
/city lawyer ebike tourist

I've seen this sort of thing only once. Going up into an out-of-the-way
valley (Val Sinestra) there was a trail of cows coming down from their
summer pasture (https://flic.kr/p/bH8xNB ) Surprisingly, they were led
by several horses, with no humans around (https://flic.kr/p/bH8xK4 ). I
moved to the side to let them pass, but left my bike close to the road.
The cows avoided this strange object, but still kept going
(https://flic.kr/p/bH8xT4 ). Humans appeared later in an SUV, after all
the cows had passed.

Where the trail ends closer to settled areas, coming down from the
pasture at the end of summer ("Alpabzug") can be a sort of parade, with
the cows being decked out for the celebration
(https://flic.kr/p/2bqbDB9 and https://flic.kr/p/NKW6cX ,
or https://flic.kr/p/bHacdR ).

At other times I've encountered groups of cows right on the road. Often
it was easy to go around them (https://flic.kr/p/LxHLkD ), but once I
had to walk right through the group. They didn't seem to care at all,
and let me pass. The only unpleasant part was that they were surrounded
by clouds of flies.

And somehow touching: Once I was standing at the side of the road
looking at a map, when a cow came over and started to lick the sweat off
my arm. An unusual but not unpleasant sensation...

You absolutely need to upgrade your trusted, but sodium-free Traktion King!
http://myhome.iolfree.ie/~hardshell/bo/fish/tk.html
Be a prepared Joerg and don't leave home without this:
https://www.salz.ch/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/3906.jpg