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Last of the Close Calls

Calf Near-Scalping

When my family lived on a ranch in Cle Elum in the 60’s, we were all involved with the care, maintenance and feeding of the cattle, horses and hogs we raised. We would put the larger calves into stanchions to tag, brand, castrate, de-horn and immunize them.

One time I was in a muddy cattle pen trying to get a calf to load into a stanchion when my boots got mired in the muck. Unable to move in any direction without undressing my feet, I was well and truly stuck.

Just then a half-grown steer or heifer decided that the stanchion was a bad idea. The animal turned and jumped over me. Its rear hoof came so close to my face next to my left eye that I felt the hair on my head carried backward with the departing critter.

I quickly realized that I had been very, very lucky.

 

Bitten by Rottweiler

When I worked with the Animal Protection Institute from 1981 to 1985, I lived most of the time in Rio Linda, CA a rural bedroom community of Sacramento. Because I was mom-cat to Deaken, a serval cat, I had to find a landlord willing to rent to me.

I found one in Rio Linda. The trailer he had for me was a dinosaur. Boards had to be placed strategically to keep me from walking through the floor. But I could have Deaken there, so I took it. In sharp contrast, Deaken’s facility was state-of-the-art.

Eldie, my landlord, had a Rottweiler mix named Bear. Although he told me to be careful around Bear, he quickly learned that Bear adored me. (Critters are astute when it comes to gauging people.)

Bear was a big brute. He was kept on a chain near Eldie’s place, which was about 200 feet from the barn.

One day as I was approaching Eldie’s house and within reach of Bear, I heard a pig squeal bloody murder in the barn. I turned in the direction of the squeal briefly, then looked back and down toward my left where Bear had been standing. Before I could move another inch, I realized that he was lunging up toward my face, mouth wide open, eyes looking like a shark. Instinctively, I thrust my arm down toward him. He latched on with a vengeance as I pushed him back to the ground, ordering him “Down, Bear!”

Thankfully, he let go. But my arm was immediately numb from where he’d latched onto me at the elbow. Fortunately I was wearing a shirt, a sweatshirt and a heavy jacket—it was very cold that morning—so Bear wasn’t able to amputate my arm. But it was so numb that I worried he might have crushed it in those mighty jaws. (A Rottweiler can apply 600 pounds per square inch with his jaws and Bear had given it his all.)

I quickly realized what had happened. Bear had heard Eldie slaughtering a pig and had taken it upon himself to “arrest” the closest being could he reach, which was me. He was protecting his livestock, he figured.

I wandered around the lot for several minutes hoping my arm would regain sensation. Then I worried that perhaps, underneath all the padding, Bear had managed to open a wound. I was fearful that my clothes would soon show bloodstains.

After about five minutes I could see that there was no blood forthcoming, so I started to peel off my clothes on top to assess damages. Even bundled the way I had been, Bear had managed to peel the top layers of my skin back, not enough to cause me to bleed, but enough to let me know that, had I been wearing fewer shirts, I would have been a real mess.

That’s the last time I got within reach of that Rottweiler.

 

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