Saturday 14 February 2015

A Wörth cow is going to join the herd at Lippeaue!

Ever since I got interested in Taurus cattle, I wished to see a cross with Hecks from the Wörth-Steinberg line. Taurus cattle have the long legs and good proportions, often a satisfying skull length, way better size, better stature and often a hump, forwards facing horns and so on. But they often lack the desirable horn size. Wörth Heck cattle would be a desirable option to boost the horn size, and in a number of individuals the undesirable Heck cattle features like the paedomorphic skull and the elongated, heavy body, are not present to the same extent as in many usual "unimproved" members of the breed. 

Margret Bunzel-Drüke from the ABU told me that they have been interested in buying a Wörth cow indeed, "Erni" is their favorite. Luckily, the owner Walter Frisch announced on the VFA's webpage that he is going to sell three pregnant (!) cows and his current breeding bull (I don't know why since this bull looks very nice, or which bull is to follow). I immediately contacted MBD to inform her about that in the hope that one of the cows will appeal them despite Erni is not among them. 
You can imagine how pleased I was when I received the answer that they are going to buy one of the cows. It will be taken to the Lippeaue in March. 

I am pretty sure that the cow is Nostra, a full-blood sister of Arizona and Aretto (the former breeding bull on Wörth), daughter of Albatros and Noriga, which all have good horns. It would be interesting to know which bull is the father of the calf she is carrying, I hope Aribo (the new breeding bull that is going to be sold now) and not one of those with the beige colour saddle. 
Here are some photos of Nostra that I took in 2013: 



I hope her will be a good cow, because a pure Heck bull is unlikely to be used at the Lippeaue. I am very much looking forward to the results this cow will bring, and I am also curious to which bull's herd she will be moved. 
As a foretaste to what we might enjoy to see within even only one generation, here:
I simply took a photo of Lamarck's fullblood sister at the Lippeaue and enlarged her horns with GIMP. 

I am very happy that crossbreeding between Taurus and Wörth cattle is finally going to happen, and that I played even a little role in it. 

3 comments:

  1. Hi, Daniel! I just wanted to say that I enjoy your blog very much - keep the posts coming! Regards Claus

    PS: What about a few posts on predators?

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    1. Thanks!
      I indeed want to do more species diversification, but I have so little time... Apart from that, I have to pay attention not to get too much off topic. But I think late Pleistocene extinct mammals and recently extinct animals are still legit. I'll see what I can do.

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    2. And you don't have to go to the Pleistocene epoch. Wolf and especially asiatic lion are very interesting when we talk about rewilding. Lion back in Europe! Not in my lifetime, I guess, but still an intriguing thought.

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