A terrifying experience that could have been a lot worse

Incident number: 1213

Response ID: 317,470,880

Date of incident: 26.10.25

Location: Footpath near the town of Eye in Suffolk, a few fields away from the playing field/par

Status: Two people with dog on lead on PROW

Holly’s story

“Footpath we were following passed through a field with cows in. My husband went in first on his own and they seemed very friendly and inquisitive, coming right up to him. I had our dog on a short lead, she is a small dog and wasn’t barking or being aggressive. I went to enter the field and after a couple of steps a large female cow tried to tip me over from behind. I didn’t fall over but let go of the dogs lead by accident. When I turned around I saw the herd of about 20 cows all charging after our dog. I was terrified they would trample her. She is quick and so managed to out run them an get over to the far corner of the field. I ran around the edge of the field to reach her, picked her up and then ran to the nearest gate to get out. The cows were quickly following us and we only just got out in time. A terrifying experience that could have been much worse, I’ve never experienced aggression from cows like that before. Some of the cows looked a little bit smaller so perhaps were young ones which would explain the aggression.”