Corsican Cows Won’t Give Up Beach Home To Tourists, Post Lockdown

Authored by forbes.com and submitted by caiyixian
image for Corsican Cows Won’t Give Up Beach Home To Tourists, Post Lockdown

Mare e Sol beach in Coti-Chiavari, on the French Mediterranean island of Corsica. AFP via Getty Images

Animals roaming the empty cities and countryside have been common during the pandemic, many taking advantage of a lack of humans. But in one idyllic tourist hotspot there are some Corsican cows who don’t want to relinquish the beach.

It is normal for the herd of wild cows to take up residency on the same stretch of beach every year, as reported by The Cut. The Mare e Sol beach in Coti-Chiavari on the French island of Corsica can be the place to be in summer for about 30 animals.

However, this summer, it appears they are objecting to having human neighbors.

Corsica has roughly 15,000 cows that roam the island–about half are wild and the other half belong to farmers who have grazing rights across the island.

In 2017, as reported by The Local, a female tourist was trying to take a holiday snap of the cows when one of them gored her in the face and she was taken to hospital. There are signs in French that tell people they are wild animals and not to get too close. At that time, the local authorities were looking for a longer-term solution, possibly involving castration or putting down some animals–although that wouldn’t work for the entire island population.

During the lockdown, the animals had more of a free rein than usual and as tourists return, they have become “unusually headstrong” as reported by the New York Post. The paper reported that a tourist was gored in the neck on a beach in Lotu and had to receive hospital treatment while some other tourists in another incident in August 2021 were chased down the street by a herd of cows in Sainte-Lucie-de-Tallano.

The Times reported that in July 2021, a 70-year-old lady was flown to hospital after a cow caused a large leg wound just a few centimeters from her femoral artery, as she was doing her laundry. Beaches in the south, near Ajaccio, had to be closed recently because a herd of cattle was “damaging cars and rampaging through picnics.”

A sign reads "Attention, wild animals, danger, stay away" near cows on the Mare e Sol beach in ... [+] Coti-Chiavari, on the French island of Corsica. AFP via Getty Images

A local counciller told The Times that “tourists laugh at this as folklore and take pictures, but it’s a real pest.” Ange-Pierre Vivoni, president of the association of mayors of Haute-Corse, the northern region, said that “it’s a problem that is enduring and getting worse.” Not so long ago, the mayor of a southern village shot dead a cow that had gored a council employee.

Part of the problem might stem from a change in EU agricultural policy–recent subsidy changes favoring the ownership of cattle meant that many farmers went immediately out to buy some. It can be a recurring problem in the Alps and Pyrenees too, with officials suggesting that tourists give these animals a wide berth, particularly if there are calves present.

pacto_pullum on August 26th, 2021 at 22:36 UTC »

Good! Lol it’d be an honor to share it with them.

reddit455 on August 26th, 2021 at 21:44 UTC »

..first I thought it said crows.

but cows posting lockdowns makes SO much more sense.

Lordofthe7thplanet on August 26th, 2021 at 21:32 UTC »

Statistically you are more likely to die from a cow attack than a shark attack.