Brown cattle | On the way to eat brown cows

Brown cattle | On the way to eat brown cows

Cattle, or cows (female) and bulls (male), are large domesticated cloven-hooved herbivores. They are a prominent modern member of the subfamily Bovinae, are the most widespread species of the genus Bos, and are most commonly classified collectively as Bos taurus.

Cattle are commonly raised as livestock for meat (beef or veal, see beef cattle), for milk (see dairy cattle), and for hides, which are used to make leather. They are used as riding animals and draft animals (oxen or bullocks, which pull carts, plows and other implements). Another product of cattle is their dung, which can be used to create manure or fuel. In some regions, such as parts of India, cattle have significant religious meaning. Cattle, mostly small breeds such as the Miniature Zebu, are also kept as pets.

Around 10,500 years ago, taurine cattle were domesticated from as few as 80 progenitors in central Anatolia, the Levant and Western Iran.[1] According to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), there are approximately 1.5 billion cattle in the world as of 2018.[2] In 2009, cattle became one of the first livestock animals to have a fully mapped genome.[