© 2024
NPR News, Colorado Stories
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
Looking to enter the cycling tour contest for Fall Drive? Contest ends at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, Oct. 9. Click here for details.

Yvonne, Germany's Runaway Cow, Has Been Captured

Yvonne, a cow that has lived in the wild since eluding a trip to the slaughterhouse in May, has foiled all attempts to capture her. Now officials say that she's not to be disturbed.
Josef Enzinger
/
dapd
Yvonne, a cow that has lived in the wild since eluding a trip to the slaughterhouse in May, has foiled all attempts to capture her. Now officials say that she's not to be disturbed.

The last time this blog checked in on Yvonne, the German cow that darted toward freedom just before she was sent to a slaughterhouse, the search for her had been called off.

The brown dairy had been at large since May 24 and won the hearts and minds of the world. But the cow had proven so elusive, authorities issued a shoot on sight order, which was later suspended partly because of public pressure.

Well — like we bring you the good, uplifting news, we must also bring disillusion: Yvonne's days as a free-range bovine are over. She's been caught.

But, don't worry, she won't end up as sauerbraten; she's now owned by an animal sanctuary.

The AP reports Yvonne actually turned herself in:

The Gut Aiderbichl animal sanctuary, which now owns the errant bovine, said Thursday that a farmer had called to say Yvonne had shown up on her farm in the Muehldorf area, near the Austrian border. One of the sanctuary's employees was able to confirm Yvonne's identity with the help of her ear tag.

...

The six-year-old cow "apparently got tired of the loneliness," the local council in Muehldorf said in a statement, adding that she had jumped over a fence to join her fellow bovines.

Yvonne is now grazing contentedly with four calves and appears "healthy and calm," it added. Her owners were on their way to pick up the cow.

Copyright 2020 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Eyder Peralta
Eyder Peralta is NPR's East Africa correspondent based in Nairobi, Kenya.