Yesterday I shot a cow: 3027. I shot her twice through the back of the head with a small-bore rifle. She was weak and unwell, because of drought, and I had to ‘put her out of her misery’ as they say. The question arose: who would put me out of mine?

Several weeks ago I had discovered 3027 in the hill paddock, down, unable to get up. The sight of a ‘downer’ cow is a depressing one. They look like they don’t understand what has happened to them and usually you don’t either. Commonly they never get up again. Your second thought, after acknowledging their predicament, is the question: are there more cows like this one that I haven’t seen? Your third, especially in a dry time: is there something wrong with the feed or the amount of feed I’m giving them? And so on.