When corporate interests come calling with plans, the call of the wild will always howl just a little bit louder. In this day and age, even with rapidly changing technology, more and more farmers are making it clear that it’s their way or the highway.

How would you handle new companies trying to push you around on your own land? One person recently shared a wild story about this with Reddit. Here’s what they said.

I guess no more electric poles

My godfather owns a small cattle ranch out in the countryside.

About 20–25 years ago, he needed electricity to power a water pump for his cows.

The nearest place where he could connect to the grid was on the opposite side of the ranch, so he paid to have utility poles installed across his property.

Seems like a proactive solution.

It was a significant investment, but he figured constantly running diesel pumps would eventually cost more than installing the poles and connecting to the grid.

Sometime later, a few neighbors who lived on the far side of the ranch asked whether they could piggyback off his electrical line.

He agreed.

A solid compromise for everyone!

They paid to install a few additional poles, and the electric company placed their meters on the other side.

So far, so good.

There were only a handful of small farmhouses, and the additional poles were located somewhere they didn’t interfere with the ranch.

This is some expert level farming.

Eventually, fiber-optic cable was installed on the poles as well.

Everything worked perfectly for roughly 20 years.

Then, about two years ago, a real estate developer bought the land on the other side of the ranch and began preparing it for a cottage development.

“Development” is a scary word in this case.

They didn’t exactly get off to a great start with my godfather.

They complained about the animals, the smell, and the noise from tractors and other equipment.

His response was basically: If you choose to live next to a working ranch, you have to accept that ranching will be happening there.

They surely knew what they signed up for…

While planning the development, they discovered another problem.

Two miles of 20-year-old electrical cable worked well enough for a few small farmhouses, but it wasn’t capable of supplying the 10–15 cottages they planned to build.

They approached the electric company about upgrading the infrastructure.

That likely didn’t go over too smoothly.

That was when everyone apparently discovered—or finally acknowledged—that the poles crossing my godfather’s ranch were privately owned.

To avoid making this story even longer, lawyers became involved.

In the end, the electric company and the developer told my godfather that he had two choices: allow the electric company to replace his poles with concrete ones and grant them right-of-way across his ranch for maintenance, or remove the poles.

Surely there has to be a secret third thing here?

So that Sunday, my godfather got on the tractor they use for installing fences and pulled out every single pole.

He told me that when he originally installed the line, he had only about one-fifth as many cattle as he has now.

His new plan is to install some solar panels, run a smaller pumping system, and make it work.

He’s getting with the times!

The development company, meanwhile, will probably have to install three or four miles of entirely new poles to bring electricity to the cottages—electricity that was apparently already included in what they promised buyers.

My godfather jokingly says it’s interesting how unusually hot this summer has been.

This guy knows what’s up.

Fortunately, he recently brought in some pigs, and they require less water than the cattle, so they’re easier to keep hydrated and fed.

Purely a coincidence, of course.

As the saying goes, you mess with the cattle, you get the horns. Let’s see what the Reddit community had to say about this one.

The comments were simply elated by this malicious compliance.

Others empathized with the grandfather deeply.

One person reveled in the comeuppance.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a man who stops helping his neighbors out with his snowplow after they complain about his farm.

Another made an astute observation.

All in all, valid points were made.

These companies are about to learn what happens when you go too hog wild.