Raining yesterday, sometimes steady, sometimes a foggy drizzle that blurred edges and made the familiar mysterious. On the ridge behind our house a white Brahman cow paced the edge, lowing. Didn't worry about it at first. Perhaps she was separated from the herd. Then Richard heard a calf.
The top of the ridge is ringed by black basalt boulders. Grass grows right to the edge of the boulders encouraging hungry mothers and playful calves into danger. If a step too far is taken it's a vertical drop of about twenty feet to the grass and lantana scrub below. Even if the fall is survived it's a hazardous and steep descent to level ground. I know. I climbed and descended it twice yesterday.
Richard came in for lunch and said he could hear a calf. The mother was still lowing on the ridge so we left lunch uneaten on the table and headed out. Walked down the back paddock and climbed through two barbed wire fences to reach the base of the ridge. The calf was now silent but we judged the position of the calf by the position of the mother. We started climbing. The lower level wasn't difficult but as we ascended the angle became sharper and the going more hazardous. Several land slips from the January floods had us climbing on our hands and knees. Worried about Richard but he was right behind me. Unfortnately no calf was in front. Above us was the shiny black vertical face of the boulders. We couldn't climb any more and had to turn back.
I'm a decent climber but I'm hell on descents. Same feeling when I'm walking on a pitched roof. I'm not afraid of heights but clambering around at an angle is unsettling. Richard went down on his butt. I worried he'd topple over and roll down the hill but his method was the right one. I stuck my butt in the clay and slid or fought through tangled grass and lantana. Deceptive because rocks were hidden in the grass so it was wise to feel with your feet first, if you could, before adding weight.
Decided Richard would go home and fetch the truck while I climbed up the track and approached the ridge, and the cow, from the top. Richard would drive to the owner's house. He is away but the property is being minded by his son. We'd rung before leaving the house but got no answer. Yet we could see two vehicles at the house.
I was wearing wellies so the trip to the top wasn't fast. Crossed the top and found the cow with a very full and painful looking udder waiting in the same spot. Told her what I was there for, that we'd do everything we could to find her calf. Brahmans can be testy about newborn calves. I didn't want to be hit in the chest by an angry mother and knocked over the cliff. But she just looked off in the distance and bellowed.
After seeing the land slips in January I was cautious about putting my weight on these rocks jutting out from the ridge, especially as it had been raining since the night before. But I did. To no avail. I couldn't see the calf nor could I hear it. Then the little blighter started bawling. I retraced my steps until I figured I was right above it. It sounded as though it was just at the base of the boulders. Sighted on a couple of trees so I could find it when I climbed from the bottom and went to meet Richard.
He'd returned without the son. Told him what I'd heard, what I was going to do. He went back for the son and I started climbing. I was certain I'd find the calf. I'd pinpointed his location from the top, memorized the position of trees and shrubs so I'd find him. Climbed to within two feet of the base of the cliff and came up with nothing.
Unattended calves will lay perfectly still to avoid detection by predators. Well, this little guy wasn't saying or doing anything. I could have cried. I couldn't travel along the cliff. As it was I was holding myself in position with handfulls of grass and lantana. The son, Mark had come in the meantime and was atop the ridge. He decided to search by going down the shallow southern end of the cliff and then working his away along to the base of the cliff where I was. I, completely soaked through, caked with clay and mud, climbed down again.
Richard stayed behind and I went home to get into dry clothes. I could see the white dot of Mark's tee shirt working along the middle of the escarpment. I didn't want to dwell on the future of the calf. He could've fallen through the thatch of dead grass and not be seen by anyone standing right above him. It was like those fake forests in Tasmania where you think you're stepping onto hard ground and fall through the foliage never to be heard from again.
But this story has a happy ending. Mark did find the calf, about twenty feet from where I had been. It was only about a week old so light enough that the fall didn't hurt it. It was stuck in a clay swale which was so slippery it couldn't get out. By this time Mum had come down from the top and was making her way along the base of the ridge. Mum and calf were reunited. The calf got a drink, Mum got relief. We all got dry clothes and a good feeling.
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