Holy cow! She's sure stuck

NICOLA MURPHY

AN EXPLORATORY trip led to disaster for a Waitakere resident when she slipped down a muddy bank and became trapped in a creek.

Cow 8507 lives at a farm on Wairere Rd, Waitakere, and strayed from her herd of five to explore the gorse and shrubs nearby.

The area was muddy because of recent rain and the animal slipped down a bank.

The cow was knee-deep in mud and water and her face was in the 2-metre-high waterfall when her owners, the Smilde family, found her.

They had come out to transfer the herd from the neighbours' paddock back to their own on Sunday, August 21, when they realised one was missing.

The family searched and called for the cow with no luck.

Jacqui Smilde says they were about to give up when they heard a reply and found her trapped at the bottom of a ravine.

"We don't know how long she'd been there but it was probably hours," Mrs Smilde says.

"She was exhausted.

"You could see she'd given up trying."

The group tried to get her unstuck but this was impossible because of a lack of trees to grab on to and the steepness of the bank.

They tried for around two and-a-half hours and eventually gave up and called emergency services.

Two rural fire brigades and a unit from Henderson station attended the incident.

Senior station officer Tony Buckwell says every person on site was needed to rescue the distressed animal.

"We needed to use winching equipment to get the poor girl out," he says.

"It was a difficult rescue.

"The embankment was almost vertical and there a huge amount of mud and slop to deal with."

Fifteen firefighters, the Smilde family and their neighbours worked together for over two hours to free the cow.

"She was going to die there if we didn't rescue her," Mr Buckwell says.

Mrs Smilde says the cow was so tired afterwards she couldn't even stand.

She was about to leave to call the vet when the cow decided to get to her feet.

"She was very shaky but we managed to lure her over to our paddock," Mrs Smilde says.

Cow 8507 has no long-term injuries but "she's a bit slower than the rest and not as jumpy", Mrs Smilde says.

- © Fairfax NZ News