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Livestock eating flagging liability
Posted by nate-the-surveyor on April 25, 2020 at 12:05 amLong ago, a farmer told us to not use long pieces of flagging, where cows could get to it. I have always followed this advice. Another farmer told me that out of a large herd, there was usually a big valuable female, that would eat anything. This was the cow that was at risk.
I’ve never had an issue with this. But, has anybody else?
Thank you
bill93 replied 4 years ago 18 Members · 30 Replies- 30 Replies
I have also, I was told the same thing 50 years ago when I worked for the power company surveying transmission line. I think that they had to buy some dead cows.
Ed
Over 40 years ago we were working in a pasture with a herd of dairy cows to design an irrigation dam. We had a couple of elevations in mind that would be critical in the long run. We placed a flag at each topo shot along each line so the farmer could actually see what land would become unusable if we went with one or the other design elevation. One line was red flags, the other was blue. We returned the next day to discover nearly all flags of one color were gone and almost none of the other color were gone. Prejudiced cows, apparently. Never did figure out what it was that got the herd to munch on only the one color.
I never saw it personally, but when I worked in the Eagle Ford shale play (TX) multiple crews told me stories of cows ingesting long lengths of flagging and then dying. It wasn’t very common, from what I heard it had to be a lot of flagging.
For cows, flagging was for eatin’, and lath and T-posts were for back-scratchin’. Depending on the circumstances, brightly colored vests were for chargin’.
“…people will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think.” -Neil PostmanI had to stake an easement that a lady had fenced off for her horses and the construction people showed up and all the flagging and lathe were gone, she claimed her horses ate them and we’re now sick and she wanted compensation. FWIW, she was bat scat crazy and would apparently bring her horses into her house.
WillyIn the old days when flagging line for logging roads we used to use long ribbons of flagging so when the squirrels would eat it at least there would be a dead. Squirrel laying nearby with a foot of flagging sticking out of his mouth.
Never had problems with livestock but I got chewed BIG TIME while staking for construction in a paper mill. Staking lines or corners I marked up the stakes and flagged them as I always had. Apparently some of the flagging came off (or was pulled off) some of the stakes and ended up in the pile of wood chips. Plastic flagging does NOT digest when the chips are placed in the digestors. The plant produced high quality printer paper and apparently one entire batch was destroyed. Ooooops!
Andy
Plastic flagging does not digest in a cow’s stomach and does not transfer from one stomach to another and plugs that hole thereby killing the cow.
That is what I remember from the aftermath of SWEPCO ruling after cattle died from ingesting flagging.
We would leave long leaders as directed by SWEPCO, Upshur Rural, and Bowie-Cass to differ between them entering and leaving substations.
The cattle deaths changed all that and we started painting at least 1ft of the tops of 1×2 lath when cattle were on the property.
0.02
Company policy is to never, ever, ever stab a pin flag in the ground. They killed 5 prize angus bulls on job circa 1984-85. The only thing that saved us was the rancher who was educated as a civil engineer and had requested the pin flags for marking out pivot lines. The bulls ate the flags, they tore up their insides which was discovered by autopsy.
There are no pin flags even allowed near the office.
Almost everything now are plastic fence stakes and orange duct tape, sometimes orange type on lath. Animals will chew on the tape. Never had problems with flagging hurting livestock, at least that I know of.
@mr Moe.
Thank you for sharing.
I use pin flags. They can poke out an eye, when kneeling down.
What you said is sobering.
I’ll be thinking this through.
Nate
I have seen a cow walking around a field with some pink flagging hanging out her azz.
It was quite amusing.
I heard about this in the ’70s. I was working for the Forest Service (no domestic animals) and sure enough, we’d flag up P-line for logging roads and sometimes upon our return to commence L-line activities (months later) most of the flagging would be chewed up, often leaving only a knot nubbin on the tree branch. I clearly remember blue flagging was attacked almost every time, and orange flagging was least popular, so we avoided using blue flagging. We also mitigated by tying the flagging to branches as high as we could reach, and only 4 inches or so instead of an arm’s length worth.
The resident old timers said it was deer (possibly elk?) thinking it was a flower or edible parasitic plant infestation. From there their opinions vary. Some said the deer actually ate the flagging, others said they either spit it out immediately or regurgitated it soon thereafter. The only first hand account I heard was from a hunter who said he witnessed a deer eating the flagging and it did not spit it out immediately.
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Here’s a rather sad story about how little it takes to entertain a Forest Service survey crew working on logging road surveys. In certain morning cool weather conditions, it’s possible to catch horse flies in your cupped hands while they’re still lethargic. We’d take a 1″ piece of flagging, stretch it till it was gossamer thin and wide, knot it to a pine needle, then carefully insert the pointy end of the needle into the fly’s anus(?) and break off the needle just below the flagging. This took some experimentation and surgical skill. After practice a five man crew could “tag” a few dozen flies in minutes every day. Release the fly and they’d live for several days and when passing through on the trail the next day or three you’d witness pieces of flagging in flight! The practice ended when the Forest road engineer who was doing his independent walkthrough saw several and thought he was having a stroke/visual hallucination. He chased one down and quickly figured out who the guilty were . . .
We were surveyors. We hated those flies. They would land on our sweat soaked single layer t-shirts, while our attention was focused elsewhere. They would sink their fangs, (hidden behind soft leather-like protective pads), into out backs. We hated them. We’d catch them, then take a piece of yellow straw, and insert it into THEIR posterior. (Pay back, yeah) and then send them flying endlessly (no pun intended) into space. They would fly with this heavy, artificial rudder into the sky. Satisfying. Pay back. Don’t let PETA know. (Is there a PETA for bugs yet?) Someday, there will be a PETA for dead trees, at the rate things are going. Scratch all that. Never Mind. It was insensitive to toothpicks. Sorry.
N
I don’t use too much flagging for the sake of all the animals. Also the long tails, even if not eaten, will get brittle, fall off and become litter.
Whenever we see the long tails of flagging waving or lots of unnecessary flagging we say “that must be there for the blind surveyors”.
Historic Boundaries and Conservation EffortsWe use to put tacks in the anus of the big horse flies that tortured us daily. They could only fly straight up.
@skeeter1996 We’re the champs. a pine needle with a skiff of flagging up their asses beats anything you folks did.
We used pin needles too, but you’re one up on us we never used any flagging, but at that time none of our job descriptions allowed us to use paint or flagging.
On the rare occasions we use a long reach of flagging it is because we will be returning soon to remove it. It is definitely handy for being able to look back from a quarter mile or more distant to sight the flagging to determine a spot for setting up the total station. Being able to shoot into that spot is critical to saving an extra turn or two. In PLSSia, a shot into the center corner, for example, is far more challenging than traversing around the section along the roads. What is great is when you can find a spot to hit nearly everything that is in the interior plus be able to shoot out to the perimeter to tie into the other section corners.
I tie pin flags around rebar and 60d and up nails and bolts and other secure monuments that they will tie to and for temporary ID, aka, there is something behind these bushes.
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