Kouprey

Live reconstruction of the Kouprey

The Kouprey (Bos sauveli ) was a type of cattle. This wild cattle was largely unknown because it hidden in the rainforest of Southeast Asia lived. Home it was in the border triangle of Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam.

Name

The name Kouprey or Kouproh has in the language of the indigenous population, the importance " gray cattle". The specific epithet sauveli reminiscent of the French René Sauvel veterinarian who practiced in Cambodia. He had the horns of a bull, which led to the discovery and first description of the species.

Species status

It had, so that you have long taken the opportunity to consider both features of gaur and banteng of this type is a hybrid of both types. There were also theories that the Kouprey is an original and now feral cattle breed. The zoologist Frits Braestrup introduced in 1960 to even the theory that the Koupreys actually had a surviving population of aurochs. Meanwhile, it is believed that genetic matches to the banteng occurred through natural hybridization during the Pleistocene.

Description

With a shoulder height of 180 cm and a weight of 800 kg was the Kouprey between the gaur and banteng the. The coat of the bull was dark brown, the cows and the calves gray. Bulls had an enormous dewlap, which reached almost to the ground. The horns of the cows were 40 cm and 80 cm long the bulls.

Discovery and eradication

Sightings of Kouprey are from the years 1860 ( by Campbell), 1860 ( by Dufossé ) and 1933 documented (by Vittoz ). The scientific description was however only in 1937 by Achille Urbain on the basis of a young male bovine that has been caught in the Cambodian province of Preah Vihear. This specimen was until his death in 1941, the Zoo de Vincennes, Paris, held. In 1938, the total stock was estimated at 800 copies, 500 in 1952 and to only 200 in 1964. Until the late 1960s, Prince Sihanouk kept a copy in the garden of his palace. In 1964 the zoologist Wharton fishing for five adult Koupreys, of whom two died and three have escaped. 1982 three Koupreys were spotted on the Thai- Cambodian border. In the attempt to capture it, died a gamekeeper by a landmine. A 1988 initiated by the IUCN rescue plan failed due to the political situation in Indochina and the fact that no further evidence were made. The Asian Wild Cattle Specialist Group of the IUCN / ISS is now assumed that the Kouprey is very likely extinct.