Taranaki farmers baffled as some cows fail to return from grazing

How do 25 cows just disappear? It's a mystery bugging some farmers in Taranaki who sent their barren cows to a grazier for a year.

It's a practice that allows the cows to be fed and mated, in the hope they come back in calf, with a cost to the farmer of $11 a day per cow. But of 62 sent, 25 didn't come back at all.

"I just want some answers," farmer Paul Stachurski told Fair Go. "The money has a bit to do with it, I'm not going to lie, but where are my animals? They don't go poof!"

The grazier, Miles Waite, said that the cows had all fallen down tomos — sinkholes — and gulleys on his land. But another farmer, John Moore, who had nine cows go missing, doesn't buy it.

"Miles says they're on his farm and I say where? And then he says they're not on his farm."

What's more, if they had fallen down sinkholes and died, Moore reckons, "there'd be one hell of a stink, but there's not".

The previous year, nine cows had gone missing, and the grazier had said that was due to the extensive floods.

Moore wanted to search the grazier's land. The grazier agreed to take him for a look, and they did find the remains of a cow, but only one.

Moore tried to find the NAIT tag, that's the tag that identifies who the cow belongs to, but it wasn't there, which he found surprising given it's made of plastic so wouldn't have decayed.

It left both Moore and Stachurski with questions for the grazier and for Progressive Livestock, the stock agents who'd arranged the contract.

But after seven months they're still asking — what has happened to our cows?

If they had died on the land, as the grazier suggested, the contract clearly states the owners should be notified within 10 hours, but that didn't happen even once.

And what's more, Stachurski still hadn't been compensated.

Moore, unexpectedly, has been refunded for his cows directly by Progressive Livestock.

The stock agents said this was due to an admin error.

Good for Moore, but not for Stachurski, who was in the middle of buying a new farm.

No-one disputed he should be compensated, but they couldn't agree on how much.

Kim Harrison from Progressive Livestock said the contract stipulated the farmers should be paid the value of the cow as if it had been fully grazed and was in-calf and in-milk.

While the farmers believed they should also be refunded the grazing fee.

This was an argument that could run until the cows come home.

Fair Go contacted another reputable stock agent who agreed with the farmers.

But Progressive Livestock stood firm saying the farmers wouldn't be out of pocket with the amount Progressive Livestock believed should be paid.

Either way, that payment was still outstanding and Stachurski told us communication had come to a halt.

It's fair to say relations between everyone had turned sour, so Fair Go took up the fight.

Progressive Livestock had experienced problems trying to get answers from the grazier, and at first, Fair Go had the same experience. Eventually though we did speak directly with Waite, who said he would pay up following the sale of his farm in mid January.

But then, Waite told Fair Go it was now the sale of the stock that was the hold-up, and that the banks required two weeks for the funds to clear.

Two weeks later we tried again, still no payment — but a promise it would come. And a few days later, it did. Stachurski was pleased to at least get something for his loss — he told us he'd given up hope of ever getting any money back.

But he still felt dissatisfied with the reasons provided for why the cows were gone.

But Waite stood his ground about the missing cows, saying they'd all fallen down tomos and gulleys on his land. He said he's done nothing wrong, but is sorry for the upset he's caused.

Fair Go were keen to check the feasibility of Waite's explanation.

We contacted Stratford District Council, Taranaki Regional Council and Geonet but no organisation was aware of any tomos or holes of note in the area.

And the property agent who'd sold Waite's farm told us, "I didn't notice any tomos as such but I did see the normal gulleys and creeks on the property which is like you see in any property in Taranaki."

So gulleys and creeks big enough for 25 cows to disappear into completely?

The property agent thought it unlikely.

So the mystery is unsolved, the farmers left scratching their heads.