The pinyin of buffalo is shuǐ niú.

1. Introduction to buffalo

Buffalo is a mammal of the genus Buffalo in the order Artiodactyla, Bovidae. Fat body. The head is large; both male and female have a pair of horns on their heads. The horns are long and slightly flat, curved in an arc, with many knotted patterns on the upper part. The forehead is wide, the mouth is large, and there are two large nostrils on the upper part of the upper lip. The skin between them is hard and smooth. hair.

The nose is broad; the eyes and ears are large; the neck is short; the waist and abdomen are bulging, and the limbs are short; the hooves are large; the skin is thick without sweat glands, the hair is thick and short, the front part of the body is dense, and the back part is dense. The back, chest and abdomen are sparse. The body color is mostly gray-black, but also yellowish-brown or white. It is named because of its water-loving habit. The life span can reach 20-30 years.

Buffalo are mainly distributed in tropical and subtropical areas, mostly in Asia, Africa, Latin America, Oceania and some countries in Southeast Europe. Chinese buffalo are mainly distributed in the south. Wild species inhabit jungles, bamboo forests or reeds. Herbivorous livestock like to eat pasture, etc. When raising, you need to pay attention. In spring, the physical strength is weak, so you should pay attention to the combination of forage and supplementary feeding of concentrate every day; in winter, you should be careful to prevent frost and cold. Breeding is highly seasonal. Estrus lasts for a long time, and the gestation period is usually twelve months.

2. History of Zoology

Buffalo has thick skin and extremely underdeveloped sweat glands. When it is hot, it needs to be immersed in water to dissipate heat. It often soaks in water, so it is named buffalo. Their legs are short and their hooves are large, making them suitable for farming; their strength, milk production and roughness resistance are higher than those of cattle; their milk fat rate is about 8%, and their milk fat is white; their meat is thicker. Because of its high utilization value, it has a long history of domestication by humans.

Domestic buffalo was domesticated from wild buffalo and may have a history of about 5,000 years. The Asian water buffalo was domesticated around 4000 BC. They are used as draft animals in many Asian countries. The earliest domesticated cattle known to China are buffalo remains found at the Hemudu and Luojiajiao sites six to seven thousand years ago.

In Europe, they are used as dairy or food cattle in Italy, Romania and Bulgaria. In Asia, buffalo are mainly used as labor force; today there are wild buffalo in India, Nepal, Bhutan and Thailand, and there are also wild buffalo in northern Australia. The origin of the wild buffalo in Southeast Asia is not very clear. They may be the descendants of domesticated buffalo that returned to the wild, or they may be the descendants of the local wild buffalo, or they may be the mating product of the two.