'Houdini' cow goes on the run in village near Horsham

Passerby Emilie Rae was walking back from a shop with her mum Barbara Crockford and pet dog Penelope when they spotted the cow on the run in Chessall Avenue, Southwater.

“I heard a cow mooing,” said Emilie. “I walked round and the cow litterally just stood there mooing to high heaven.”

She said she thought it was one of a herd that had been delivered to a nearby farm the previous day.

"It did a Houdini,” she said. "It had managed to escape from the cow shed and was trotting down the road.

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"A lot of people walk their dogs through there as it’s a public footpath.

"My dog is animal-reactive so I told my mum to hold her while I went over to talk to the cow. I don’t know why I thought I would talk to it. It was staring a death stare.”

But it all ended well when the farmer was alerted and the runaway cow was taken safely back to its shed.

However, the cow wasn’t the only escapee animal that day. On the same day a stray sheep was reported to be on the loose in another nearby village.

The sheep was seen walking past cars along Manor Road in Upper Beeding.

Villagers took to social media to report the sighting with one person suggesting the sheep had done a ‘ewe turn’ and another speculating that it was ‘looking for Mary.’