Beefalo Cattle Livestock

Beefalo are a fertile hybrid offspring of domestic cattle, Bos taurus, and the American bison, Bison bison. The breed was created to combine the best characteristics of both animals with a view towards beef production. Beefalo are primarily cattle in genetics and appearance, with the breed association defining a full beefalo as one with three eighths (37.5%) bison genetics, while they call animals with higher percentages of bison genetics as 'bison hybrids'.

Accidental crosses were noticed as far back as 1749 in the southern English colonies of North America. Cattle and buffalo were first intentionally crossbred during the mid-1800s. Charles Goodnight was one of the first to succeed, and called his hybrid cattalo. After seeing thousands of cattle die in a Kansas blizzard in 1886, Charles Jesse 'Buffalo' Jones also worked to cross buffalo and cattle, with the hope that they would survive the harsh winters.[1] He called the result 'cattalo' in 1888.[2] Mossom Boyd of Bobcaygeon, Ontario first started the practice in Canada. After his death in 1914, the Canadian government continued experiments in crossbreeding up to 1964, with little success. Lawrence Boyd continues the crossbreeding work of his grandfather on a farm in Alberta.

It was found early on that crossing a male buffalo with a domestic cow would produce few offspring, but that crossing a domestic bull with a buffalo cow apparently solved the problem. The female offspring proved fertile, but rarely so for the males. Although the cattalo performed well, the mating problems meant that the breeder had to maintain a herd of wild and difficult-to-handle buffalo cows.

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The World