Cattle |
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Friesian/Holstein
cow |
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Conservation status |
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Domesticated |
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Scientific classification |
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Binomial name |
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Bos taurus |
Cattle (often called cows in vernacular
and contemporary usage, or kye as the Scots plural of cou) are domesticated
ungulates, a member of the subfamily Bovinae of the family Bovidae. They are
raised as livestock for meat (called beef and veal), dairy products (milk), leather
and as draught animals (pulling carts, plows and the like). In some countries,
such as India, they are subject to religious ceremonies and respect. It is
estimated that there are 1.4 billion head of cattle in the world today.[1]
Cattle were originally
identified by Carolus Linnaeus as three separate species. These were Bos
taurus, the European cattle, including similar types from Africa and Asia; Bos
indicus, the zebu; and the extinct Bos primigenius, the aurochs. The
aurochs is ancestral to both zebu and European cattle. More recently these
three have increasingly been grouped as one species, sometimes using the names Bos
primigenius taurus, Bos primigenius indicus and Bos primigenius
primigenius. Complicating the matter is the ability of cattle to interbreed
with other closely related species. Hybrid individuals and even breeds exist,
not only between European cattle and zebu but also with yaks, banteng, gaur,
and bison, a cross-genera hybrid. For example, genetic testing of the Dwarf
Lulu breed, the only humpless "Bos taurus-type" cattle in
Nepal, found them to be a mix of European cattle, zebu and yak.[2]
Cattle cannot successfully be bred with water buffalo or African buffalo. (See aurochs
for the history of domestication, and zebu for peculiarities of that group.)
The word "cattle"
did not originate as a name for bovine animals. It derives from the Latin caput,
head, and thus originally meant "unit of livestock" or "one
head". The word is closely related to "chattel" (a unit of
property) and to "capital" in the sense of property.
Older English sources like King
James Version of the Bible refer to livestock in general as cattle. Additionally
other species of the genus Bos are often called cattle or wild cattle. This
article refers to the common modern meaning of "cattle", the European
domestic bovine.
The term 'cattle' itself is
not a plural, but a mass noun. Thus one may refer to "some cattle",
but not "three cattle". There is no universally used singular
equivalent in modern English to 'cattle' other than the various gender and
age-specific terms (though 'catron' is occasionally seen as a half-serious
proposal). This is a rare situation in the English language and hence a source
of confusion. Strictly speaking, the singular noun for the domestic bovine is ox:
a bull is a male ox and a cow is a female ox. That this was once the standard
name for domestic bovines is shown in placenames such as Oxford. But
"ox" is now rarely used in this general sense. Today "cow"
is frequently used by the general population as a gender-neutral term, although
it is meant to be used solely to mean female (females of other animals, such as
whales or elephants, are also called cows). To refer to a specific number of
these animals without specifying their gender, it must be stated as (for
example) "ten head of cattle." Some Australian, Canadian, New Zealand
and Scottish farmers use the term 'cattlebeast' or simply "beast". In
some areas of the American South (particularly the Appalachian region) the
local inhabitants call an individual animal a "beef critter". This
was common until the 1960's and has faded from usage in all but a few areas and
even then it is used mostly among the aged inhabitants.
Obsolete terms for cattle
include 'neat' (horned oxen, from which 'neatsfoot oil' is derived), 'beef'
(young ox) and 'beefing' (young animal fit for slaughtering). Cattle raised for
human consumption are called 'beef cattle'. Within the beef cattle industry in
parts of the United States, the older term 'beef' (plural 'beeves') is still
used to refer to an animal of either gender. Cows of certain breeds that are
kept for the milk they give are called 'dairy cows'.
Young cattle are called calves.
A young female before she has calved is called a 'heifer' [3][4]
(pronounced /ˈhɛfəɹ/,
"heffer"). A young female that has had only one calf is sometimes
called a "first-calf heifer." A castrated male is called a 'bullock'
or 'steer', unless kept for draft purposes, in which case it is called an 'ox'
(plural 'oxen'), not to be confused with the related wild musk ox. If castrated
as an adult, it is called a 'stag'. An intact male is called a 'bull'. An adult
female who has had more than two calves is called a 'cow'. The archaic plural
of cow is 'kine' or 'kyne' (which comes from the same English stem as 'cow'). The
adjective applying to cattle is 'bovine'.
An Austrian
cow
Cattle are ruminants,
meaning that they have a digestive system that allows them to utilize otherwise
undigestible foods by repeatedly regurgitating and rechewing them as
"cud." The cud is then reswallowed and further digested by
specialized microorganisms that live in the rumen. These microbes are primarily
responsible for breaking down cellulose and other carbohydrates into volatile
fatty acids (VFAs) that cattle use as their primary metabolic fuel. The
microbes that live inside of the rumen are also able to synthesize amino acids
from non-protein nitrogenous sources such as urea and ammonia. These features
allow cattle to thrive on grasses and other vegetation.
Cattle have one stomach,
with four compartments. They are the rumen, reticulum, omasum, and abomasum,
the rumen being the largest compartment. Cattle sometimes consume metal objects
which are deposited in the reticulum, the smallest compartment, and this is
where hardware disease occurs. The reticulum is known as the
"Honeycomb." The omasum's main function is to absorb water and
nutrients from the digestible feed. The omasum is known as the "Many
Plies." The abomasum is most like the human stomach; this is why it is
known as the "True Stomach."
The aurochs was originally
spread throughout Europe, Africa, and Asia. In historical times, their range
was restricted to Europe, and the last animals were killed by poachers in Masovia,
Poland, in 1627. Breeders have attempted to recreate the original gene pool of
the aurochs by careful crossing of commercial breeds, creating the Heck cattle
breed.
A popular misconception
about cattle (primarily bulls) is that they are enraged by the color red. This
is incorrect, as cattle are mostly color-blind. The myth arose from the use of
red capes in the sport of bullfighting; in fact, two different capes are used. The
capote is a large, flowing cape that is magenta and yellow. The more famous
muleta is the smaller, red cape, used exclusively for the final, fatal segment
of the fight. It is not the color of the cape that angers the bull, but rather
the movement of the fabric that irritates the bull and incites it to charge.
The gestation period for a
cow is nine months. A newborn calf weighs approximately 35-45kg. Cows can live
up to be 25 years.
A cow emits a large amount
of methane gas in a single day; 95% of this methane is produced through belching,
not flatulence [5]. As methane is a potent greenhouse
gas (23 times as warming as carbon dioxide), research is underway on dietary
supplements that can reduce these releases.[6].
Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Cattle&action=history
http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html