Two runaway cows named Bessie and Clyde have finally been caught in Massachusetts after five days on the loose, ending a chase that needed a police thermal drone to finish. The pair escaped from their enclosure in Marshfield last Thursday and were corralled on Monday night.
Bessie and Clyde, two cow siblings, were at large for five days until police managed to return them on Tuesday, according to Boston 25 News. The cows were found in woods off Wright’s Way after the Plymouth County Sheriff’s thermal imaging drone picked them up in the dark.
A five-day game of hide and seek
Marshfield police first posted about the pair on Thursday, near Ferry Street and Main Street, and warned drivers to watch for the animals on the roads. The two black cows were seen by motorists on Route 3A on Friday, and one was briefly reported captured — only for police to confirm later that both were still missing.
The cows kept disappearing and reappearing around the town, and their dark colour made them exceptionally hard to see at night, in dusk or in rain, police warned. Town Administrator Ted Langill said officials had identified the owner, though it is not clear whether anyone will face a citation.
Drone finds what eyes could not
Police eventually located the pair in nearby woods using the sheriff’s drone with infrared cameras. The two cows were humanely tranquilised before being loaded into a trailer and returned home on Tuesday.
Marshfield Police Chief Phil Tavares told local radio station WATD that officers had spent four days searching for the runaways. In a post, Marshfield police said the cow and bull were “officially on their way back home” and thanked the community for its “incredible patience and cooperation over the last few days.”
The Marshfield cow caper is the second runaway-cow story to go viral in the north-east in recent weeks, after a Highland cow named Maggie led police on a four-day chase in Carmel, New York, in late October before being lassoed and reunited with her calf.
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