Area resident is still looking for two washed-away calves
<p class="p1">If cattle could talk, Konnie Plumlee’s small herd of yearlings would surely have an amazing story to tell. Fourteen of the 15 yearlings washed away April 29 when Lick Creek overflowed its banks as it flowed through Plumlee’s farm north of Gainesville off Highway 5 near the southwest entrance to Caney Mountain Conservation Area. </p><p class="p1">“I brought them up to higher ground to feed them, hoping they would stay up there,” Plumlee told the <em>Times</em> Monday. But she thinks the sound of the rising, rushing water in Lick Creek spooked the young cattle, and they fled to the far end of the farm, where the water quickly rose with a rushing current that carried them away.</p><p class="p1">“My neighbor drove down there and told me there was only one left in the field,” Plumlee said. </p><p class="p1">The animals were carried downstream and ended up scattered throughout the Gainesville area. Posts went up on Facebook, asking residents to watch for the angus-cross cattle, and Plumlee’s friend Janet Johnson scoured the area on horseback, looking for the lost herd.</p><p class="p1">Eventually, one by one, most of the cattle turned up: one at the Gainesville ball park, one at the Gainesville Cemetery, another at the city’s sewage lagoon and another was spotted “walking along Highway 5,” said Plumlee, a veterinarian who works for the state and also organizes each year’s Hootin an Hollarin pet show. </p><p class="p1">The one yearling that might have the most interesting story to tell is the one that somehow escaped the strong Lick Creek current and made its way up the hill to the home of Mark and Rhonda Suter, which stands behind the First Christian Church off Highway 160 east of the Gainesville square.</p><p class="p1">Six head found their way home, Plumlee said, and one was found dead in the creek. </p><p class="p1">Two are still missing: one white heifer and one black heifer, both with yellow tags marked 5J on their right ears. Anyone finding the animals is asked to contact Plumlee at 417-224-9612 or Janet Johnson at 417-257-4566. </p><p class="p1">Despite the loss, the experience has left Plumlee with her always-positive attitude intact. “When you lose your possessions, you find your friends,” she said.</p>
<p class="p1">Gainesville resident Konnie Plumlee, shown in this photo taken at the 2016 Hootin an Hollarin pet show, which she has organized for several years, has found all but two head of the 15 angus-cross yearlings that washed away in Lick Creek from her farm north of Gainesville. One was found in the Gainesville Cemetery, and another turned up at the Mark and Rhonda Suter residence behind the First Christian Church off Highway 160 east of the square.</p>
