Cow and bull lead Edmonton police on merry chase
A cow on the lam in north Edmonton is back in captivity after escaping from a nearby slaughterhouse but a bull sent to lure the animal was still on the loose.
Police staked out an area near the Belvedere LRT station after 7 a.m. Wednesday after reports that a cow escaped from Edmonton Custom Packers.
The niche packer slaughters animals according to Islamic tradition, said employee Mohammed Jomha.
The animal escaped through an open gate, said Jomha, who laughed at the attention garnered by the cow.
"In Lebanon, if a beef ran away on the street, nobody cares," he said.
"What I saw here — all policemen, helicopters, everybody saying, 'Stay here, stay here.' It's unbelievable. It's a very, very good country."
The testy bovine charged a police car, damaging the cruiser while climbing over it.
It rammed the vehicle several times before officers could chase it into a fenced-off field in an industrial area, said spokesperson Clair Seyler.
At one point during the roundup, a bull was set loose in an attempt to lure and control the cow. It failed, and hours later the bull was still loose in a field near the LRT station.
Over the noon hour, another plan was hatched — release more cows, with the understanding that it's easier to manoeuvre cattle in a group.
The animals would then be rounded up using snowmobiles.
The original rogue cow was eventually coaxed into a cattle truck after a couple of hours but the bull was still on the loose.
A trail of hay was laid to an open trailer in hopes that bull would wander back into captivity.
However, that tactic didn't work so a man with a tranquilizer gun was seen heading into the field around 4:40 p.m. A front end loader, a police car and a trailer followed shortly afterwards.
