Roaming cattle now back safe at Johnsburg farm, police say

All five of the cattle – four Texas Longhorns and a bull calf – seen wandering the Johnsburg and Spring Grove area last week have been found by their owners and returned to the farm, the Johnsburg Police Department said Tuesday.

Two of the cattle actually made it all the way up to Wisconsin before eventually being located and taken back home, Johnsburg Police Chief Keith Von Allmen said.

“We were just trying to act as a conduit between the public and the farmer,” Von Allmen said.

The first to be caught, the bull calf, was photographed at Johnsburg Junior High School last Thursday.

The farm where the cattle lived is located in unincorporated McHenry County, police said. The cattle originally got loose due to a broken fence, which has since been fixed, according to a Facebook post by the owners.

The five cattle roamed free for less than a week, but a runaway bison, nicknamed Tyson by locals, wandered the region for about six months before finally being captured and returned to its home farm, Milk & Honey Farmstead outside Wauconda, in February, according to a Facebook post last month.

The 800-pound female bison first got loose in September and was a brief sensation over the course of the next several months in both Lake and McHenry counties, the Lake County Sheriff’s Office reported at the time.