Missing heifers recovered

Rancher Debbie Dust couldn't believe her eyes on Tuesday when the pasture holding eight Black Angus heifers and a bull was empty — vacant — the animals had simply disappeared.

"We should be able to find some manure piles or something, but right now, there's nothing," said the Bruno-area rancher who had been looking for the animals since Tuesday from the area about 45 minutes east of Saskatoon.

Late Friday the animals were found. But they were in the field of another farmer about 30 kilometres away near Cudworth. The farmer had heard about the missing cattle on CBC radio, spotted the animals grazing in his field, and called the Dusts on the phone.

How the animals escaped from the pasture then covered that distance remains an enigma.

"Its still a mystery — a real mystery," Debbie Dust said. She and her husband have nearly 400 head of cattle and have been ranching for years. This was the first time any of their cattle have mysteriously vanished. The pasture fence was intact. The gate was closed. But the pasture where the nine Black Angus cattle were last seen was vacant. They had simply vanished.

After searching for three days, they worried the animals had been stolen by rustlers and contacted the RCMP, who have now been called off the case.

The ranchers plan to keep the cattle in their yard for the next few days, worried the animals might have eaten contaminated grass since other farmers in the area have been spraying pesticides.

But missing cows are not unheard of in Saskatchewan according to Jack Hextall, president of the Saskatchewan Cattlemen's Association. It's just a question of figuring out where they went and why.