Aggressive or curious cattle? Either pose a risk to walkers.

3 recent reports follow, 2 with dogs, 1 without. All the walkers felt worried enough by the cattle’s behaviour and exited the field across potentially dangerous routes. People may argue some of the cows were “just” curious or playful rather than aggressive. If a 1/2 ton of animal is “curious” and comes charging towards you or pins you to a gate, that is dangerous. Cattle pose a risk to walkers. So what is the solution?

Signs indicating dangerous cattle in the field will not happen as the law states no dangerous animals should be kept on land with public access. Banning dogs across fields of cattle clearly will not solve the problem, half of our reports are from people with no dog. Educating people to “respect the cows” will not help, you can respect a charging cow as much as you like, but it won’t make you safe. Giving cattle a wide berth, not getting between a calf and mother, having a calm dog on a short lead – all good ideas but we have reports from those who follow all the above and yet were attacked. The solution is fencing off cattle from walkers. Read the following reports and decide what you would do in that situation.

Report no 1248
Response ID 329,601,481
2 people no dog, heifers
20/5/26
Location: ///dawn.many.study Marldon, Devon
Clare’s report: Two of us (no dog) walking on public footpath that follows an L shape around edge of field. The field rises up above path, and cows are up above us about 30m away as we enter field. We walk along the footpath and are talking, about 15 or more young cows start to rapidly come down towards and behind us, cutting us off from our route. They do not back off as we stand still with arms out and say ‘away’ loudly. We slowly backed towards a barbed wire covered gate in the corner of the field. The cows continued to approach. My friend scales the gate and then so do I, to exit field. Cows come right behind us up to gate. We are unhurt but shaken.
We would like cows in another field or an electric /other fence in field to separate cows from walkers. Signs. Clare has informed HSE and The Ramblers.

No 1249
Response ID 329,651,900
Single walker and dog, group of cows
26/5/26
Location: large field opposite Ditchling common (road between Plumpton and Burgess Hill). East Sussex.
Hamish’s report: I was walking on my normal route. The herd of cows (approximately 20 metres away) were to my left. One cow turned and started running towards me. I ran into the bushy forest area but there was no exit. I went through thorns to try and get out the other side of the wooded area. I got out and thought I was safe but then saw the entire herd had followed me and were moving swiftly towards me. I ran again heading towards the style. Fortunately there was an electric wire fence just before the style which I got under. The entire herd stopped en masse at this fence about 3/4 metres from me. Genuinely terrifying!
This seems to be a particularly aggressive herd of cows and there should really be signage to state that.

Report 1255
Response ID 329,745,322
2 people with dogs on leads, group of cows 5/6/26 Location: Crawley, Cotswolds Pauline’s report: We were walking on a public trail path with our dogs which we kept very close by our sides on leads. I was nervous but we walked around the cows which all seemed very interested in us. Quite quickly we found all the cows walking towards us from different directions. There was a gate to our right which was locked, I managed to get over, by the time I was over the cows had my husband pinned to the gate, I told him to ‘just let the dogs go’ which he did & they managed to get under the gate & he then was able to climb over by now all the cows were huddled together really pinning him tight to the gate. By the time he got over I was terrified, a bad headache at the top of my neck was in full swing, my husband tried to comfort me at which point I started to collapse in his arms.
I truly believe cattle should not be allowed to kept in fields with a public footpath running through. I’m not a city girl, I was bought up in the country & enjoy country walks with our dogs however this has really frightened me so I don’t think I’d follow a countryside trail again just in case we could come across cows