Limbo was a cow. On our first morning in our new house we looked outside and there she was munching the grass just outside our kitchen window.
The house in question was a granite semi detached building on Bodmin Moor, with two bedrooms, thirteen decayed and dilapidated hen houses and a cows house. The garden was a rough patch of grass. We didn’t replace the two scaffolding bars that served as a gate as Limbo was stopping the grass from getting too long.
At milking times, as soon as the farmer called from his gate across the field and up the hill, Limbo would quietly leave our garden, go up the hill and join the herd on its way into the milking shed. Within a couple of hours after milking she would be back in the garden. “She always goes there”, explained farmer Derek, “Ever since she was a small calf. She got under the fence”.
On day had to working on the drains. Not wanting Limbo in the way I tried to drive her out of the garden. She did not want to go. I persisted and eventually she left and watched while I replaced the two bars forming the closed gate.
In the morning Limbo was back outside the kitchen window. Again she was awkward about going, making it quite clear she didn’t want to. I fixed the iron bars more firmly, even though they were still as I had left them.
This went on until she was caught in the act. She went under the lower bar of the gate. A fully grown Fresian Cow, she straddled her legs, got her head under the bar and wriggled her way forward until she was clear. And the bar was only a foot and a half above the ground!
An hour or so after milking was over she came back under the fence. She was allowed to stay.