BEEN IN LE for a loooonnngggg time.
been in shootouts, drug work/undercover/hired killer, sniper on an EST unit, done about 500 "front doors", worked the "grave yard" shift(in THAT area gave a whole new meaning to the term)in one of the most violent ghettos in the United States.... just didn't think there was THAT much left to do or experience.

For the last 2 months a large Black Angus bull has been roaming the North end of the county occassionally coming out of hiding from the State forest it had been roaming in. No one has reported it gone and efforts to discover it's owner have failed.

Over the last week it has taken to being a REAL problem on the back roads with seveal people almost crashing into it. It started traveling South into the more populated part of the county and started walking the roads more.

At 0130 this AM I was doing about 15mph on this one dark road when it loomed up and almost was a hood ornament. (if I had been doing my usual 25mph it would have been in my lap. Could NOT see it until it was about 10 feet in front of the car. It was like he was a black hole and just sucked in the light and reflected nothing)I turned on it and followed as it continued into the edge of the city walking down the center of the paved road. Did slow pursuit for about 2 miles then it turned and headed for a main traffic state highway on an East/West road. Refused to be driven into a field and every time it thought the patrol car was "too close" it would turn and glare or take a short charge at it.

All attempts to get an animal control officer or vet there were failing. AS it approached to within 300 yards of the main road it would be backgrounded by a large hill before it openned into open farm field then a road where "flatlander" vacationers traveled in their minivans at 60mph. (now THAT would also be a whole new definition to the term "road hazard")

Grabbed the "shorty", an 11 1/2" bbled M16 out of the rack and pulled up to where I could get a shot, before I could get out of the car it came at the car again, then turned and started to trot towards the main road.

Ever try to place that TINY(55gr .223 fmj S&B) little bullet somewhere vital on a LARGE 1200+ pounds VERY black animal in the dark, while it is moving, while YOU are moving/driving parallel...it's something you do NOT get trained for at the police academy.

First round was placed just behind the head in the neck where they join, trying for a spine shot. The shot stopped it, it sat down as it backstepped faltered, then turned and looked at the veh and started to get back onto all four so a couple more were tatooed into the forehead, and then it dropped.(for all you "big bore" folks, there was no problem pulling down from recoil for follow-up taps)

Gave a WHOLE NEW definition to "road kill" and "shooting the bull". Had to have the DPW bring the BIG front end loader to get it off the road.

Don't have a clue what the City is going to do with it, but the suggestions of a city cookout/barbeque were raised by the people who showed up.

Have had to kill lots of "life forms" over the course of the years. THIS is by far the biggest with the SMALLEST caliber. One thing about LE work...you just never know what is next to come. (now if I could just get them to add a gunlock for the .375H&H Reminded me of the old Gahan Wilson cartoon showing the guy and his wife standing on a New York street and he was ejecting the empties out of his double rifle next to the elephant carcass and the wife was saying, "I'll never ask you again why are you always carrying your elephant gun" )

LC, my resume reads much like yours. Great story! Nope, I never tipped over a bovine but you're absolutely right about never knowning what comes next. That's the good news ....

Cheers!

Redial

Now, there is a hunt!

Well all us old farm boys have dropped 1200 lb steers with single shots to the head for butchering with 22 rimfires. It is all about bullet placement.

[ 07-26-2003, 06:01: Message edited by: p dog shooter ]

Were there no other cattle in nearby pastures? Normally a wayward bull will jump or craw through a fence to meet the ladies, even if they already have a resident bull. Yeah, probably wasn't much penetration. Just enough to blow bone chunks into the brain. The neckshot made him sick.

Lawcop ,i am close in the resume field,no Gettho work as of yet but when i worked the county i had to take a Shire horse out, that was pissed at the local traffic,he was almost as heavy as your steer

who would have thought Michigan has large and dangerous bovids.

My dad quotes that comic to my step-mom every time he buys a new rifle.

I didn't know that they had Ghettos out there. :-) i know that the military used to send their doctors to the medical center 7 minutes from my house to give them a taste of "battlefield" conditions.

Red

Properly placed, a .233 will drop an elephant. Not sure about Rhinos though, didn't have those in 'Nam.

I would find some roper with a good steer horse and rope the SOB haul him in a trailer and go to the nearest sale barn and make enough money to buy a nice rifle, or get hung for cow theft....

I smashed 3 270 150 gr. corelokts to hell and gone on the neck of a Charlias bull some years ago and when he ran me up on top of my neighbors PU. I shot him point blank twice in the head, he turned ran off and I shot him twice more in the shoulder he took a fender and door with him...He died in some thick brush about a mile from the incident...

No, I would not use a 223 on any bovine....tried to rope him for two days prior, and he got in the brush and turned my horse over on me twice, and crippled my neighbors horse badly, enough of that! get the gun...He weighed 2400 plus pounds at the locker. Even the hamburger was tough.

and they say we have Mad Cow!!!

Well, I guess that proves a .223 is a stopper, but a .270 is too small.

JUST HAD a talk with the DPW worker who took the bull for processing. He was there when they were hiding and fleshing it out. said that one of the vertebrae just behind the head had just the smallest noticable half moon crease in the top of it.

Must have been the first shot that got his attn. Just enough shock to stop him but certainly not enough to put him "down". That is why I fourple tapped him in the forehead.

Said they got between 400-420 lbs of meat off of him.

Pesronally I would have rather had my .375H&H at that range but ya gotta do what ya gotta do with what ya got.

If one more person comes up to me and asks "hey, wanna to shoot the bull?" I think I'll have enough provocation for justifiable homicide, or at least temporary insanity.

Last night I had to drop another car hit deer, and it has lost all it's....vigor. I am ruined for the future.