When I lived in Idaho, my neighbor found his dead dog draped over his mailbox because it wondered onto another neighbors land that had cattle. The law is on their side, and this issue goes back over 100 years, though the details differ.
In western states (like Utah) if you hit a cow on a highway you are going to pay for both, the car repairs and the cow. People die all the time: black cows, open road, after dark, the cows are invisible.
It's the type of story that city people (who spend 0.01% of their time in rural areas) seem to be astonished by because their lifestyles are so different. Trying to impose your will on people in an area you've barely lived seems quite arrogant to those that live there 100% of the time.
Oh. I hadn't found the story astonishing, sorry. To be honest, I feel like you're the one coming off as arrogant, to suggest that there's some impassible divide between those that live in rural communities, and those that live in cities. I don't believe this is the case.
