Been looking for a horse property for a while. Found one (25 acres) which abuts a 120 acre property that just sold as well. Prior owner of 120 acres ran a horse boarding operation. New owner plans to use the place for Angus. Cows haven’t “moved in” yet. Should I be concerned? The presence of a few Angus owned by my roping neighbors on our prior farm didn’t seem to be an issue (but that was 5, not 100+). TIA for any thoughts.
My 10 acre farm is surrounded by my neighbor’s 200 acre cattle farm and I love it (because he is a great guy too).
Here is my list of pros…
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cow neighbors don’t complain like human neighbors.
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Loud gatherings (too old to party, lol) don’t bother the cow neighbors.
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My neighbors pays me to do a first cutting and round bale my pasture for his cows.
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My neighbor lets me borrow whatever equipment he has (huge tractors, manure spreader, etc…)
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The friends and family price for beef is awesome.
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The beef cattle do not smell like dairy cattle.
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After the first week of being on my farm my horses could care less about the cows. The other neighbor’s alpaca seems to be more of a dilemma.
Personally I’m happy with my neighbors:)
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We have cattle on two sides of us, no problem. Occasionally some may get lose but the horses just ignore them.
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Yeah, you should probably worry and look for land in a gaited horse community------------------------
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I think you’ll be fine. Horses might ‘look’ at the cattle for a bit, but will soon ignore them even in numbers – especially since that cattle smell is already familiar to them.
Since you are asking this question I have to assume you have a worry. What about living next to the Angus are you personally worried about? Then people can specifically address that.
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Our neighbors are cows (real cows). The horses for the most part ignore them, if one or more gets loose the horses may run around acting crazy for a minute but then they do that when they see the neighbor up the road riding her horse past our place or any number of other reasons.
I wouldn’t be concerned. Cows for neighbors are nice to have. I love seeing baby calves playing. If there is a down size it would probably be a chance for an increase in flies.
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Are these new next-door neighbors experienced cow people? Or city folk wanting to get into cattle?
How wonderful that they want to raise cattle and not build 100 “farmettes” on that acreage! Maybe you and they can hold both properties for preserving the land as land. 
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my mare lives with my farms angus show heifers through the spring until fall. No problems at all.
I love angus. Mine are 100% pastured and our bull is very docile. I don’t pet him and let him think he’s a pet but you can walk through the pasture and he isn’t going to pick his head up from eating.
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The flies are horrendous. You will not be able to do much about them. If you live in a place that gets a lot of rain, they will stink and there will be lots of mud. If you share a fence line, that would be a concern for me as cattle need STRONG fences to stay put. My neighbor has long horns right next to us. Not a fan particularly.
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Thank you all for the great comments. I really appreciate it. We’ve lived “in the country” and are pretty realistic about the pros and cons but our area isn’t ranch land, more typically corn, soybeans and hay. My take is these perspective neighbors fall closer to the gentleman rather than experienced rancher category.
my parent’s farm is nestled right in the crook of two old, long-standing farms in a slowly-expanding suburb. one of the farms is mostly only produce and dairy, the other is produce/livestock- so cows have been part and parcel for a long time.
one of our paddocks, the grass one specifically, is less than 40 ft away (separated by a tree line) from our neighbor farmer’s grass field that houses (~20, usually yearlings) cows from early spring to late summer, and sheep the remaining year. other than the occasional balk from our horses, it really has been no problem. they don’t smell anymore than our horses do.
we don’t see more flies than usual, but they do occasionally till the manure on their fields - for about a day or two, the stink is awful – but i’ve noticed the farmers are doing it later at night now, and by midday the following it’s not bad at all. it doesn’t bother me, having grown up with livestock – but we do occasionally hear people complaining about it.
no problems as far as bovine diseases/vectors go. been 15+ years.
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Thanks Beowulf, that would essentially mimic our situation. We’d share 700 feet of property line seperated by a nominal tree line on one side of a roughly rectangular lot, one other side farmed with corn/soybeans, third side a large lot residence (no horses just a few goats, fourth side the road. In an Ag zoned area with some nearby slowly encroaching development.
The part about the fence is right but the rest is not unless the acreage is overstocked. If the pasture isn’t overgrazed or overstocked, it will be no different than having horses next door. Better really, as you won’t have to worry about fence “socializing”.
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We have neighbor cows on two sides, as well. Other than one particular neighbor’s cows escaping on a fairly regular basis, it really doesn’t affect us at all. And when they do escape it’s usually the weaners, who just run amok on the road or get stuck in someone else’s fence. They redid the fencing this winter so hopefully, no more escaping. They don’t bother the horses and frankly, I have more fly trouble from the boarding barn on the other side.
I’d bet with 120 acres they will probably rotate various pastures, so you may not even see or deal with cows for much of the year.
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You would though a space ship had landed when our neighbor brought in a few Angus …the horses were all ears fixed on their new neighbors … strange thing was they had actually been used to work Herefords, so they knew what a cow was but were decidedly upset
My mare was SURE our mini Donk was an alien for a week 
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oh try doing a Parade of Breeds for a livestock show…let’s seen its Miniatures…then Morgans … daughter’s Morgan mare had never see a miniature anything before… she was quite concerned
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:eek::lol:
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We sold 65 acres surrounding our farm to an Angus rancher!! Better than horsey “neighbors” because the horses don’t scrap over the fence with the cows!! I see no problems with our situation!! The calves do seem fascinated with the horses, but don’t bother them!! And now all my horses are “cow broke”!!
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