Cornish farmers rescue 40 Wagyu calves from sea
Robin Kendall (left) and Polly Dugmore © ITV News West Country A herd of about 40 calves have been rescued from the sea after escaping from their field and ending up on a rocky outcrop in the middle of the night.
The 10-week old Wagyu calves were spotted 50m off Colona Bay last Friday (2 August) after pulling a pin on their gate at Bodrugan Barton farm at Mevagissey, Cornwall.
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In total darkness, and with the tide rising, farmer Robin Kendall and his vet partner Polly Dugmore, along with Robin’s dad Tim, raced into action to save them.
Polly, who donned a wetsuit and a lifejacket to swim them back to safety, said: “We could just see calf eyes glinting back at us because it was so dark.
“There wasn’t enough space on the rock for the calves to stand on it, and the water had risen to sort of midway up their bodies.”
Robin took to his boat, towing some calves to safety, while Tim stayed on the rock, shining a torch to light the way, and Polly swam the other cattle to the shore.
She said: “I managed one or two at a time by just sort of swimming behind them, and acting like a bit of a rudder.”
While some were easy to direct, four panicked and tried to swim out to sea. Adrenaline kicked in, and Polly was able to get them all back to safety.
Robin said any farmer would have done the same thing to help their animals.
He said: “We were just lucky we had a boat, a swimmer and all the equipment to be able to do it, and the coastguard was there to help if anything went wrong.”
The Mevagissey coastguard praised Polly for swimming back and forth to the rocks.
“She did this for a marathon 90 minutes, by which time the sea was up to their necks,” said a spokesman, following a three-hour call out from 1am to 4am.
“Luckily all the cattle were brought safely to dry land –a good result and no injuries to the farmers.”
The Kendall family would like to thank the family in a boat that was moored in the bay that night, who initially called the police and triggered the rescue operation.