Tauros

What do Tauros cattle look like?

Tauros is not a fixed breed but a line of cattle being built by a breeding programme. The animals are crosses drawn from several robust, mostly southern European breeds, with Highland stock added for its long, dense coat. Because each founding breed varies, the project selects individual animals to keep in the scheme. Cattle of the fourth cross-generation had already been born by 2015. The goal is an animal that resembles the aurochs, the wild ancestor of domestic cattle, and can live without human help.

Where does the Tauros come from?

The programme was set up in 2008 as the TaurOs Project, and breeding began the next year. It is run by the Dutch foundation Stichting Taurus together with universities, among them Wageningen University and Research Centre. The aurochs was hunted out of most of Europe in the Middle Ages; the last known pure-bred animal died in Jaktorów Forest, Poland, in 1627. An earlier attempt at an aurochs look-alike, Heck cattle, was made in the 1920s by Lutz and Heinz Heck.

What the Tauros is known for

Hardiness comes first here. The breeds chosen are tough enough for grazing projects, and the Highland is valued both for its dense coat and for its stamina. Behaviour and food choice among the chosen breeds are being studied, and the project examines whether any aurochs genes survive in them. The Spanish fighting bull, the Lidia, was left out because of its aggressive nature, even though it was said to be genetically close to the aurochs.

How the Tauros is bred and kept

Crossbreeding and then selective breeding are the methods. Very hardy breeds are chosen, preferably ones that already look something like the aurochs. Because animals within a breed differ, selection criteria decide which individuals join the project. Parallel studies look at possible aurochs introgression into European cattle, and at how the breeds feed and behave. Founding stock is mostly Iberian and Italian: Sayaguesa, Maremmana primitivo, Pajuna, Limia, Maronesa, Podolica and Tudanca, plus Highland, with Boškarin used outside the Netherlands.

What the Tauros is kept for

These cattle are bred for the land, not for milk or meat. The long-term plan is to let them run free in European rewilding reserves, where they would take the place of the aurochs as large grazing animals and help keep open, park-like countryside rich in wildlife. Project members hope Tauros herds will one day move through nature areas much as red deer, wild boar and wolves do. Until then they graze in managed reserves and grazing projects.

The land and climate of the Tauros

The programme works with European nature reserves and rewilding sites. Under the wood-pasture hypothesis, large grazing animals are seen as a tool for keeping open or park-like landscapes diverse without human interference. Herds have been placed in the Netherlands, from Keent and the Maashorst to the Kraaijenbergse Plassen and Rotterdam harbour, and further afield in Portugal, Spain, Croatia, the Czech Republic and Romania, including the Danube Delta at Sfântu Gheorghe.

Keeping Tauros cattle

The animals are kept in reserves and grazing projects rather than sheds, so the emphasis falls on choosing stock that can look after itself. What the chosen breeds eat is also being studied. Handling is not without risk: in 2014 a Sayaguesa bull from the programme killed a mountaineer in the Velebit Mountains, and the bull was euthanized afterwards.

Related breeds and crosses

This is one of several breeding-back attempts, and the Uruz Project is another. Heck cattle, bred in the 1920s by Lutz and Heinz Heck from a number of breeds, were an earlier effort; they turned out hardy but differ from the aurochs in several respects. Heck cattle are used in German grazing projects alongside Galloways and Highland cattle. Most founding breeds of the Tauros Programme are themselves primitive cattle, and some are highly endangered.

Numbers, conservation and the herd book

By the end of 2015, more than 150 animals of the founding breeds had gone into the breeding programme and almost 300 cross animals had been born, 17 of them in the fourth cross-generation. Every founding breed except Boškarin is bred in the Dutch herds. Outside the Netherlands the main founding breeds are Sayaguesa, Maremmana, Maronesa and Boškarin, helped by crossbred animals from the Dutch sites. Releases began in Portugal and Spain in 2013, Croatia in 2014, and the Czech Republic and Romania in 2015.

Questions people ask about Tauros

Good reading and sources

• Tauros Programme on WikipediaEncyclopedia
• More photos on Wikimedia CommonsPhotos and video
• Wikidata recordOpen data