Saturday, April 1, 2023

Aurochs, the Mega-Cow

The Aurochs were around during the last ice age, although I seldom think of them as an ice age megafauna. 'Auroch' is German for "original ox" and is pronounced OR-ock.

Auroch is the megafauna ancestor of all domesticated cattle. During its prime, a male auroch stood about six feet high at the shoulder and weighed a ton, although other websites said they could have weighed 3,000 lbs. The species lived from 2,000,000 to 500 years ago, inhabiting the plains of Eurasia and northern Africa. There is no indication that they ever made it to the Americas. The last auroch, a female, was killed in Poland in 1627.

Cave paintings of Auroch from Lascaux in France have been dated to about 17,000 years ago. Humans hunted them for food, and they also domesticated it, a past-time that eventually led to modern cows.

There were actually 3 separate subspecies of auroch. Bos primigenius primigenius is the best known subspecies, and is the one depicted in the Lascaux cave paintings. It was native to Eurasia. Bos primigenius namadicus, or the Indian Aurock, was domesticated a few thousand years ago into the Zebu cattle. The North African Auroch (Bos primigenius africanus) is the most obscure of the subspecies, and is likely native to the Middle East.

In the 1920s, a pair of German zoo directors attempted to resurrect the Auroch by selective breeding of modern cows. The result was a herd of oversized oxen known as Heck cattle. Hopes for the resurrection of the Auroch persist, although by using more advanced science than the Heck brothers used.

 

https://www.thoughtco.com/auroch-1093172

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