Report number: No. 749
Date of Incident 12 08 23
Location: Cliff Farm, Elton, Derbyshire. On public footpath.
Single person, no dog
When I entered the field the cattle and bull were lying down mostly at the bottom of the field a good distance away from me and the footpath. I didn’t see any young with them. As I started walking across the field they stood up and one started making an awful, aggressive sound. I continued calmly, didn’t change direction or pace and kept walking away from them.
There were a couple of cows very close to the footpath, they let me pass without any problem. I heard more noise, looked back and they were starting to walk quickly towards me, so I sped up as the field is quite big. When I looked back again they had start running towards me along with the two I had recently passed by. So I had to run!
I just made it to gap in the wall before the closest one reached me. I dived through and my ankle caught in the gap and fell. I hurt my ankle, shin and knee as I fell. It was a terrifying experience, the gate very close by was wide open and they could have come through there so I was still terrified as I crossed the next field. Thankfully, they stayed at the wall and continued to make aggressive noises.
Additional note – I had walked through another field previously with cattle (grid ref – SK21972 61197) I don’t know if it belongs to the same farm. This was a much smaller field and they had young with them. The cows didn’t mind me walking through, even though I had to walk straight through the herd and I had no issues, however I did notice as I was a good way over the field that there was a massive bull in there too with no signage anywhere. If it’s the same farm, it makes me think it’s a farmer with a bad attitude to walkers and rights of way.
Cattle Safety 