I have been posting photographs taken in the 1960s on the Facebook Group, Hong Kong in the 1960s. Recently I added several taken on a walk from what was then the town of Tai Po east along the northern shore of Tolo Harbour in the New Territories. The next one in the series is of an ox tethered in the corner of a field but before posting it I realised that I knew nothing of the cattle, other than the dairy cows, of Hong Kong. A Google search found a paper published this year which throws some light on their origin.
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| A photograph I took in early 1966 near Tai Po in the New Territories of Hong Kong |
In the years up to the 1980s, when Hong Kong had an active agricultural economy, local farmers used cattle and water buffalo as draught animals; a single ox* pulling a plough or parked on the edge of a holding to graze was a common sight throughout the rural areas. They were not kept nor bred for milk or meat. As agriculture virtually died out in the face of a massive building programme, some of the remaining draught animals became feral often to the still-continuing inconvenience and annoyance of the human population as they wander through the country side and country parks, into towns and onto roads. Estimates of the current cattle population exceed 1,200. Official reports described them in the 1960s as ‘local brown cattle’ with local used in the sense of local to south-east China. Other reports describe them as ‘Chinese brown cattle’.
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| Ploughing paddy fields in Hong Kong in the 1960s From Rob Taylor's family collection and posted in the Facebook Group: Hong Kong in the 1960s |
Completely separate and isolated populations of cattle also existed until relatively recently. They provided milk for the European population. Not surprisingly, these dairy farms held dairy breeds originally from Europe. In the 1960s, the dairy farms in Hong Kong had mainly Friesians. The study raises interesting points on the history of dairying in Hong Kong but that topic will have to wait for a future article, suffice it to say that what started as a plan by the father of tropical medicine grew into something very big indeed.
Given the presence of dairy cows in Hong Kong for many decades it is not surprising that when the genomes of cattle sampled from the feral Hong Kong population were compared with those of other breeds, evidence of genes from European breeds was found. At some time in the past cattle from the dairy farms must have bred with ‘local’ animals albeit in small numbers.
Another unsurprising finding was that the feral Hong Kong cattle, not having been selectively bred for milk or beef, were genetically diverse. However, the main finding from the research described in the paper was that the population is genetically distinct ‘from other taurine, indicine and crossbred cattle populations’, and showed evidence of a significant contribution of wild bovine species to their genomes.
Given the morphological characteristics of a shoulder hump and a large dewlap, the lack of a match to taurine breeds (essentially breeds derived from the aurochs and referred to as Bos taurus or Bos taurus taurus, of western and northern Eurasia) would be expected. However, the lack of genetic similarity to any breeds of indicine cattle (domesticated from Bos taurus indicus or Bos indicus in southern Asia) does seem more unexpected. The authors of the paper concluded:
We showed that Hong Kong feral cattle, are distinct from Bos taurus and Bos indicus breeds. Our results highlight the distinctiveness of Hong Kong feral cattle and stress the conservation value of this indigenous breed that is likely to harbour adaptive genetic variation, which is a fundamental livestock resource in the face of climate change and diversifying market demands.
There is, as the authors also suggest, the possibility that the Hong Kong cattle represent a separate domestication to that or those which occurred in India, for example, from a wild indicine ancestor at some time in the past.
I have some qualms about this paper. I am unqualified to comment on the molecular genetics but I do wonder if the Hong Kong cattle (minus the small contribution of genes from European dairy animals) are simply representative of a type of beast found throughout south-eastern China as a draught animal. Agricultural practice does not stop at political borders and there was free flow of supplies and livestock between Hong Kong and the ‘mainland’†. It seems inconceivable to me that the Hong Kong feral cattle are something special to Hong Kong. Surely they are the remnants of a much more widely distributed domestic animal? Are there any draught animals still used in southern China, or any feral populations that could be studied?
This paper then opens the door to further research using additional techniques. The authors end with:
While showing that the H[ongK[ongF[eral] are genetically different from other cattle populations, additional unbiased data, including mtDNA, Y chromosome and whole genome sequences are necessary to better define the origins of the HKF cattle and explore whether they may be traced to an independent domestication event.
Do Hongkongers now have to recognise their pesky feral cattle as a rare breed worthy of preservation both as a cultural memento and as possessing a unique set of genes?
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| New Territories, Hong Kong, late 1967/early 1968 |
*I am using ox here in the wide sense, not that of a castrated male used for draught purposes. Other than ox and its plural oxen there is no singular noun in English to describe male and female, young and old cattle.
†In supplementary material published alongside the main paper, the authors appear to be confused not only on the history of agriculture in Hong Kong in the latter half of the 20th century (it went on later than the 1950s, and still does in a very small way) but also on trade. They suggest that the flow of livestock into Hong Kong from mainland China ceased when the UN imposed an embargo in 1951 during the Korean War. That is incorrect. Britain and therefore Hong Kong only imposed a ban on the export to China of militarily strategic goods. Only the U.S.A. imposed an embargo on the import of Chinese goods—one that was maintained until 1972. Goods made in Hong Kong in during that period had a certificate of origin that had to be presented to U.S. customs in order for souvenirs to be imported by returning tourists. Brits in Hong Kong viewed with great amusement the absence of American tourists from stores selling mainland Chinese goods and the efforts of some to get the purchases they did make into the U.S.A.
Barbato M, Reichel MP, Passamonti M, Low WY, Colli L, Tearle R, Williams JL, Marsan PA. 2020 A genetically unique Chinese cattle population shows evidence of common ancestry with wild species when analysed with a reduced ascertainment bias SNP panel. PLoS ONE 15(4): e0231162. https:// doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0231162
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