Bos sauveli (Kouprey)

[Melanie]

anotherspecialist said:

Known also as the wild forest ox of Indochina, the enormous kouprey is the least known species of wild cattle alive today. No scientist has observed a kouprey at close range since 1957, when zoologist Charles Wharton studied and even filmed the animal in the wild. This study remains as the sole source of ecological and natural history information on the kouprey. Grey to dark brown or black, kouprey’s bodies are massive but narrow, their legs long, their backs humped. Males may stand two meters at the shoulder and weigh up to 2,000 pounds. Adult males have a pronounced dewlap, up to 16 in long. Both sexes have curiously notched nostrils and long tails. The horns of the female are lyre-shaped with antelope-like upward spirals. The widespread horns in the male arch forward and upward.

What kouprey remain today probably live a skittish, nocturnal life in inaccessible habitats consisting of open deciduous forests, grasslands, wooded grasslands and patches of closed monsoon forest. Most live in areas receiving 40-80 inches of precipitation per year and there are indications that they move to higher elevations during the rainy season. Kouprey typically graze in open areas during the day, entering the forest for shelter from the sun, refuge from predators, and to seek food when the grasslands are dry. Like other wild cattle species, kouprey are primarily grazers but will browse as well. They are active mainly in the late afternoon.

There was a kouprey in the Vincennes Zoo in Paris in 1937. It was thought to be a gaur calf when it arrived from Saigon, but was determined to be an animal of an entirely new species as it grew to adulthood. The animal lived at the zoo in Paris for three years before starving to death during the German occupation of France. In 1964, Charles Wharton embarked on an ill-fated expedition to capture some kouprey but of the five animals captured, two died and three escaped. There have been no kouprey in captivity since Cambodia’s Prince Sihanouk kept a kouprey calf on his palace grounds at Phnom Penh, likely sometime during the 50’s. The IUCN/SSC Asian Wild Cattle Specialist Group Action Plan recommends investigating the potential for developing both in situ and ex situ range country programs for this species.

www.csew.com/cattletag/Cattle%20Website/Fact_Sheets/Kouprey/kouprey.htm

[Melanie]

sebbe67 said:

This remarkable, undated photograph from James Mellon shows a “Sunday hunter” from Phnom Penh posing with
an adult bull kouprey: he is said to have shot several over the years. This photograph was published in the
November 1970 issue of Animals Magazine in a feature about the rarest animal in the world. James Mellon saw
two kouprey and numerous sets of trucks in what was koulen-promtep rescue north of Chhep. This area forms part
of an IBA but there have been no hints that kouprey survive in the area.

www.birdlifeindochina.org/report_pdfs/babbler4.pdf

photo

[Melanie]

anotherspecialist said:

pic sebbe67 found

[Melanie]

carlos said:

bucardo said:

BTW, What are that "hairs" in kouprey horns? I see it often in kouprey drawings, but never in photographs.

According to what I've read, it seems taht the kouprey uses its horns in way that made the horn-tip splinter radially giving origin to those hair-like crowns very close to the horn tips. If you look carefuly it is possible to appreciate it in the photograph found by sebbe and posted by Frank.

Those horn splinters are alos visible in these pics, that I've posted previously:

[Melanie]

anotherspecialist said:

Thanks for the pics sebbe67 and carlos first time i've seen them.

[Melanie]

sebbe67 said:

A Celebrity Among Ungulates May Soon Be Dismissed
In the 1930's, the kouprey trotted like a revelation out of the forests of
central Indochina and into the world of modern science. Here, after all, was
a large wild ox with the speed and grace of a deer and an impressive set of
horns, yet it had been hiding in plain view, having never been officially
discovered by science.

But now, just 70 years after the first captive kouprey was sent to France
from Cambodia for study, the last species of wild Asian cattle to become
known scientifically may become the first to vanish in modern times - and
not necessarily through extinction. Rather, three biologists from
Northwestern University and the Cambodian Forestry Administration have
proposed a taxonomic demotion. In a paper published online in July by The
Journal of Zoology, they say the kouprey (koh-PRAY) is probably a domestic
hybrid that became feral, a zoological poseur, not a valid species.

The biologists' proposal has met stiff opposition within the small group of
scientists who study Asian wild cattle. Several say the paper misinterpreted
the genetics and history of the kouprey, which may still exist in
domesticated form. Although rare, elusive and enigmatic, kouprey are
recognizable enough, longer-legged, more graceful, faster and slightly
larger than the closely related banteng, and slightly smaller than the gaur,
the largest of the wild cattle.

Kouprey bulls stand just over six feet tall and weigh up to 1,800 pounds,
with a humpback, a dewlap - the loose fold of skin dangling from the neck -
that can drag the ground and elaborate curved horns. Females are about
three-quarters the size of males, have little or no dewlap, and their horns
spiral at the ends. Kouprey are probably extinct in the wild, victims of
overhunting, war and habitat loss. There have been no confirmed sightings in
more than 20 years, and even unconfirmed sightings have been rare since the
1990's. There are no kouprey in any of the world's zoos.

But if the kouprey is not a species, then the word "extinction" does not
have its usual meaning. Or as Gary J. Galbreath, the lead author of the
paper, put it in an e-mail message, "It is pleasant to realize that humans
have probably not, after all, caused the extinction of a species in this
case."

In their Journal of Zoology paper, Dr. Galbreath and his colleagues say the
kouprey most likely originated as a cross between two domesticated species,
the banteng and the zebu. Dr. Galbreath said in an interview that the animal
might have become wild in the 19th century as a result of the societal
disruption that followed an invasion of Cambodia by Thailand, then called
Siam. Although the kouprey reproduced in the wild, they were in decline
almost from the moment of their escape from domesticity.

The researchers say their conclusions are based on analysis of mitochondrial
DNA, or DNA inherited only from the mother, taken from two living Cambodian
banteng and from the taxidermic remains of that first captive kouprey
shipped to France in 1936.

Essentially, they found that the mitochondrial DNA sequence of the kouprey
matched that of the Cambodian banteng, indicating a common maternal
original. Anticipating criticism, Dr. Galbreath and his colleagues
considered two alternative interpretations. A vast genetic mixing hundreds
of thousands of years ago involving banteng and a zebu-like wild ox could
have produced the kouprey, they said, but that was unlikely because such
events were rare, and there was no evidence that the wild ox existed.

It is also possible the kouprey was a naturally occurring species whose
females, as its numbers declined, mated occasionally with banteng. But the
researchers doubt that could have produced two captive banteng with kouprey
mitochondria.

Here is the twist: in 2004, two French scientists, Alexandre Hassanin and
Anne Ropiquet of the National Museum of Natural History in Paris, sequenced
the taxidermic kouprey's DNA to show that the kouprey was a natural species,
not a hybrid. They posted the sequence in a public genetic data bank, where
it was available to Dr. Galbreath's team, which turned the French scientists
' conclusion on its head.

Dr. Hassanin and Dr. Ropiquet have fired back. In a recently submitted
paper, they argue hypothetically that if the Cambodian banteng represents a
separate species from the Javan banteng, then the kouprey could have derived
from the Cambodian version, as the Galbreath team proposes. But it was more
likely, Dr. Hassanin said in an e-mail message, that the kouprey was a
natural species that evolved in Southeast Asia. On at least one occasion
more than 100,000 years ago, a kouprey mated with a banteng. Their
descendants are Cambodia's banteng, with mitochondrial DNA more closely
resembling kouprey than banteng.

To complicate matters further, last February Dr. Hassanin and other
colleagues published a paper in the journal Comptes Rendus Biologies arguing
that a specimen mounted in 1871 in Paris and thought to be a domestic ox
from Indochina was, in fact, a domesticated kouprey. The specimen has been
at the museum in Bourges since 1931.

Dr. Hassanin said several indigenous Asian breeds of cattle might be derived
from kouprey. Herds, especially in Cambodia, should be tested to see whether
any are pure kouprey, Dr. Hassanin and his colleagues said, adding that if
they are, steps should be taken to preserve them.

Where Dr. Hassanin sees pure kouprey, Dr. Galbreath finds his banteng-zebu
hybrid. Independently, both say that more extensive sampling and analysis of
mainland banteng are needed to determine who is correct. Commenting on the
papers, Simon Hedges, an Asian cattle specialist with the Wildlife
Conservation Society who was not involved in either study, tended to agree
that the Cambodian banteng had probably hybridized with the kouprey. But he
also suggested that the kouprey both groups studied might itself have been a
banteng-kouprey cross.

"A key message to take out of this debate is that the same forces -
overhunting, war, habitat fragmentation and loss - that caused the likely
extinction of the kouprey are still at work on other species, such as the
banteng," Mr. Hedges said. "The challenge is to keep them from suffering the
same fate as the kouprey, whatever it was."

[Melanie]

anotherspecialist said:

source for above

www.nytimes.com/2006/09/12/science/12kouprey.html?ex=1158206400&en=a13cfe8ed74c1523&ei=5087%0A

[Melanie]

anotherspecialist said:

from same source above



The kouprey was caught on film in a series of movie frames shot in 1951 in Cambodia.

[Melanie]

sebbe67 said:

Today, much of the Kouprey's habitat has become a battleground for bands of guerrillas who have planted land mines
throughout the region and hunt and snare wildlife for food. After the Vietnam War and the Khmer Rouge occupation
of Cambodia, Kouprey were only seen rarely (Stewart−Cox 1995). A 1986 survey found fragmented, small
populations remaining in most of its range (Nowak 1999). A few Kouprey were seen in the 1980s trying to migrate
through the steep escarpment separating Cambodia and northeast Thailand, but they apparently died in booby−traps
set for people (McNeely and Sochaczewski 1988). The skull and horns of a female Kouprey were offered for sale in a
shop in Poipet, Cambodia, in 1994 for $400, according to biologists surveying illegal trade in the country (Martin and
Phipps 1996). The Kouprey has little chance of surviving without protection from hunting unless a large sanctuary is
set aside for it. No strong conservation measures have been taken to date. No Koupreys are in zoos. It is possible that
this species is already extinct.


www.endangeredspecieshandbook.org/pdfslive/esh_chapter9.pdf#search=%22kouprey%20was%20caught%20on%20film%20in%20a%20in%201951%20in%20Cambodia.%20%22

[Melanie]

sebbe67 said:

Investigative Reports: In Search of the Kouprey
1999


PLOT DESCRIPTION
This documentary, part of the Investigative Reports series from the Arts and Entertainment Cable Network (A&E), explores the mystery and myth behind the one-ton kouprey, the national animal of Cambodia. Narrated by Investigative Reports host and producer Bill Kurtis, this video explains why there is little known about this native animal of Southeast Asia. Because of Cambodia's controversy within the latter part of the 20th century, scientists and animal activists have not gotten a glimpse of a kouprey in the wild for over 40 years. The jungles of Cambodia which the kouprey calls home are so remote and dangerous that men and women trying to find a living example of this animal have encountered everything from attacks from other jungle animals to injuries from land mines left from past Cambodian conflicts. ~ Cecilia Cygnar, All Movie Guide

[Melanie]

sebbe67 said:

THE ULTIMATE NOWHERE
TREKKING THROUGH THE CAMBODIAN OUTBACK IN SEARCH OF THE KOUPREY

By Steve Hendrix
Originally Published: December 19, 1999
Ratanikiri Province, Cambodia - So, this is nowhere. And here I finally am, right in the middle of it. After years of extreme, uncomfortable and downright unwise treks in search of the world's most remote places, I finally made it to the rearmost of backwaters, the most track-free of trackless wilderness. After countless war-story swap meets with other hard-core travelers, I finally scored supreme bragging rights by getting here -- a Godforsaken, deserted jungle in northeast Cambodia.

This is the heart of darkness, no-man's-land, a recent sanctuary for Cambodian guerrillas, the route of the old Ho Chi Minh Trail, ground zero of Nixon's secret bombing campaign. For decades nobody has ventured into this isolated jungle but tribal hunters and a few Khmer Rouge holdouts. Just getting here took a numbing progression of prop planes, Russian Jeeps, torturous roads, leaky dugout canoes and, finally, an elephant train -- all in the company of a heavily armed security escort. But here I sit, happily exhausted, reveling in the certainty that I will never be as untouched and untouchable by the "real" world as I am at this instant.

"Guess what," says my campmate, walking over. "Michael Jordan just announced his retirement. And it's snowing in Chicago. Anybody else want to use the satellite phone?"

I stare up at my campmate. He's Bill Kurtis, the veteran CBS newsman, more recently the mellifluous host of almost nightly documentaries on A&E. Right now, Kurtis is just a dark silhouette before the unforgiving Asian sun. Behind him a wisp of camp smoke rises where our Cambodian guides are killing our morning chicken. And far overhead, in unseen orbits, the modern world is standing by.

"Why not," I answer, getting to my feet. I call my wife in Washington, and as she's telling me we're almost out of cat food, I watch one of our guides -- a former Khmer Rouge guerrilla -- assemble his Chinese B40 rocket launcher for the day.

This odd trek started several months earlier with a phone call from Kurtis. For his A&E series "Investigative Reports," I'd sent him an offbeat idea for a documentary on the search for Cambodia's national animal, a massive wild ox called the kouprey. In spite of some impressive derring-do by biologists, journalists and general adventurers over the years, no one but local hunters has seen a kouprey up close since the early 1960s. This is no snail darter -- the kouprey stands 6 feet tall, weighs a solid ton and sports a massive rack of horns. But the unbroken play of war, genocide and general mayhem raging through Southeast Asia has rendered the kouprey invisible to the eager eyes of science.

But now a shaky peace has taken hold in Cambodia, and reports of kouprey sightings have been trickling out of Cambodia's most isolated backcountry -- a stretch of mysterious forest on the Cambodia-Vietnam border. This pristine dry forest was sealed for 30 years, most recently as a sanctuary for Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge guerrillas. It reportedly houses some of the rarest animals in the world: wild elephants, tigers and -- just maybe -- kouprey. I sent Kurtis a magazine article I'd written about the kouprey and suggested the time was right to jump-start the search. He agreed.

"Let's go," he said simply that day on the phone. "You make the arrangements."

You make the arrangements? I gulped a yes, hung up and wondered what travel agent I could call for this one.

Miraculously, salvation arrived only a few days later via e-mail from Cambodia. I had blanketed my few contacts in Asia's wildlife community with pleas for advice. A response came back from someone I didn't know, an expatriate American living in Phnom Penh named Hunter Weiler. A former big game hunter and Department of Energy official, Weiler had taken early retirement and relocated to Cambodia to pursue, of all things, the search for the kouprey.

Over the next six months, Weiler and I and Kurtis' staff in Chicago whittled away at a mountain of logistical details until a plausible itinerary began to take shape. Elephant mahouts were recruited, officials bribed, boats hired, bayonets sharpened, batteries charged, inoculations endured, embassies alerted and guns loaded. And finally, on a sunny Thursday in January, I walked out of the rarefied comfort of Thai Airways Business Class into the muggy mystery of Cambodia and its signature ox.

I had 48 hours in Phnom Penh to finalize plans before Kurtis and crew arrived from Chicago. From our base on the rooftop terrace of the Foreign Correspondents Club -- where the city's jaded expatriate community takes its gin with purified ice and a view of the Mekong -- Weiler and I honed our plans. We picked our way repeatedly through the gantlet of legless veterans and beseeching scooter drivers around the door of the club on our way to glad-hand officials at the American embassy, tour the medical facilities at the Western clinic and meet the helicopter pilot who would come fly us out if things turned ugly.

Two days later, I go to the airport to meet Kurtis, his cameraman and two sound guys. This is the first major hurdle. Having any our gear seized would be a catastrophe, and lots of gratuities had already changed hands to ensure that our small film crew could pass through unobtrusive and unaccosted. So it's with mouth agape that I watch as case after case marked "Kurtis Productions" tumbles through the baggage door -- scores of plastic crates filled with high-end video cameras (five of them), camping gear, portable computers, radios, navigation units, a generator, batteries all sizes, cords, cables, adapters, blank tapes, medicine, expedition wear, business attire, bug repellent , fuel tanks, water bottles, TV monitors, Palm Pilots, American toilet paper and mountains of other goods, all of which is guaranteed to spark a gleam in the eye of any customs officer.

Our two Cambodian liaisons take one look at the load, turn pale and head straight to customs where they pass out more "gifts" to the nice officers. It takes half an hour of muttered consultation, but suddenly we're rushed through without opening a single case. In a caravan of six vans and taxis, we head into the capital.

Two days later -- after a whirl of last-minute provisioning and one embassy cocktail party -- we're back at the airport ready to go upcountry. Our crew is bigger with the addition of Weiler, a trio of earnest young Cambodian wildlife officers and every box of Thailand-made corn flakes I could find in the markets. Now, it's on to an aging Royal Air Cambodia puddle jumper for the jarring flight to Ban Lung, capital of the northeastern province of Ratanikiri.

Ban Lung may be a weekly stop on the local airline, but it still falls way off the edge of the country's limited tourist map. The runway is a red dirt strip, the terminal an open-air hut, the whole town not much more than a rustic hamlet. A crowd gathers to stare impassively at the six foreigners busily overloading a line of hired Jeeps. We have about nine hours of bad roads ahead over the next two days.

Slowly, I'm beginning to relax. So far, Weiler's local colleagues have come through with every promised vehicle, interview and meal. For his part, Kurtis -- with the career adventurist's perverse love of discomfort -- grows only mellower as we make our way deeper and deeper into the heart of darkness. As our standards slip from basic to brutal, his mood rises from amiable to downright joyful. That's good, because we're about to meet the boats.

"You want me to put $120,000 worth of video equipment in that?" says cameraman Skip Brown. We're at the bottom of a steep bank on the Sre Pok, surrounded by our stuff . . . and more is being schlepped down from the jeeps by an ant line of local porters. The tower of cargo begs for a barge, but the three boats tied up are more like hollowed out pencils -- long, low motor canoes a yard wide and 30 feet long. Two of them are being vigorously bailed. Some nervous muttering breaks out among the Americans, and it's only made worse when Weiler comes over to fill us in.

"We'll hit our first rapids in about two hours," he says. "We should be fine after that unless the river bandits are still about."

Rapids and bandits in a floating pencil? The Cambodians smile politely at our concern. "No worry, no worry," they assure us (in fact, they routinely ply these waters with much larger boatloads of fish). But at our request, they send out the call for more boats. Within an hour, every boatman in the village motors over, willing to sign on for a week's work. We hire all comers, and by the time we load up and pull out, we're an impressive flotilla of eight under-loaded canoes.

The day on the river is charming, if brutally hot. Our rigor mortis, gunwale-clenching fear of overturning slowly gives way to languid repose. We lean back and watch brilliant birds, tidy riverside farms, a lush corridor of jungle. And then, as we pull into the last village before the frontier, our placid mood evaporates as men with automatic rifles surround and cover us from the bank. There's a mortar launcher trained our way. A machine gun is mounted on a log. We smile wanly at the crowd staring down on us.

"We're from American TV."

More muttered consultations. Two hours later, they let us pass.

That night -- in complete, moonless darkness -- we reach our base camp about 10 miles shy of the Vietnam border. We pitch our tents, eat a little dried fish and call home.

For the next three days -- filthy, happy and armed to the teeth -- we lumber about the forest on elephant back. We shoot hours of video, eat pounds of rice, bathe in the river and drink foul Cambodian wine. We count stars, read by flashlight and surprise soundman David Huizenga with his first elephant-dung birthday cake. We have fun. And we make enough racket to scare away every kouprey in Asia. Maybe that's why we didn't see one.

Yes, every rendezvous has been made, every plane has flown, every boat launched and against all odds we've gotten the entire party here healthy and ready to work -- a triumph of extreme travel planning. There's only one problem: No one remembered to book the kouprey. We don't see the slightest trace of one. In fact, we don't see any animals at all -- not a glimpse or a whiff or a grunt of anything with fur and hooves. Tracks and scat, that's all. A few birds and lots and lots and lots of bugs. Otherwise -- and this is problematic for a wildlife documentary -- not a single example of living wildlife.

The TV folks are concerned. The biologists, meanwhile, are ecstatic. The terrain exceeds their fondest ecological dreams, mile after mile of unspoiled dry forest, classic wild cattle country. "The animals are out here," says one, "but they've been so overhunted that now it takes at least six weeks of constant, quiet field presence to actually see one."

Six weeks? Alas, as they say on TV, we're out of time.

Our show will have a new ending, a frightening denouement -- even in this most isolated of backwaters the animals are in big trouble. What was once billed as one of Asia's richest wildlife habitats is now a ghost forest, home to a few skittish critters being slowly picked off by hunters armed with the weapons of modern war.

Three days later we're back in the hotel bubble in Phnom Penh. And we're calling home. But you know something?

The connection was better out in the middle of nowhere.

www.felidae.org/PROJECTS/Tiger_in_Cambodia/kouprey_article_chicago_tribune.html

Steve Hendrix is a writer and producer who lives in Washington, D.C. His -- and Bill Kurtis' -- documentary, "In Search of the Kouprey," will air at 8 p.m. Dec. 22 on A&E.

[Melanie]

admin said:

The article on the possible hybrid origin of the Kouprey!

Galbreath, G. J., Mordacq, J. C. & Weiler, F. H. (2006) Genetically solving a zoological mystery: was the kouprey (Bos sauveli) a feral hybrid?. Journal of Zoology 0 (0).

[Melanie]

anotherspecialist said:

Source for entry sebbe67 found titled below

Investigative Reports: In Search of the Kouprey 1999

PLOT DESCRIPTION

movies2.nytimes.com/gst/movies/movie.html?v_id=249452

[Melanie]

melanie said:

Asia's Kouprey May Not Be New Species

Among the rarest mammals in Southeast Asia, the kouprey's discovery almost 70 years ago in the jungles of Cambodia stunned the scientific community and led to a decades-long campaign to save it from extinction.

But what if this elusive forest ox wasn't a natural species after all?

That is the controversial premise raised by Northwestern University biologist Gary Galbreath and his colleagues F.H. Weiler and J.C. Mordacq in a paper published in April in the Journal of Zoology.

Galbreath and his team compared the DNA from two kouprey skulls - something previously impossible because of technological limitations - with that of the Cambodian banteng and found they were similar.

They concluded that the kouprey, which may well be extinct, most likely originated as a hybrid bred from domestic banteng and zebu cattle in Cambodia a century ago and only later became wild, rather than arising in the wild as a natural species.

"The kouprey has acquired a rather romantic, exotic reputation," said Galbreath, associate director of Northwestern's Program in Biological Sciences in Evanston, Ill. "Some people would understandably be sad to see it dethroned as a species."

The paper stirred up wild cattle specialists who have spent decades trying to save the kouprey. They say the conclusion was hasty and based on insufficient data.

The kouprey, a nomadic ox with dramatic curved horns that resembles a water buffalo, was first identified in 1937 as a new species. It was discovered in the forests of Cambodia, but scientists believe its range at one time stretched into parts of Vietnam, Laos and Thailand.

Conservationists ever since have led a frustrating campaign to save the kouprey.

American zoologist Charles Wharton failed in the 1960s to capture the beasts - two died and three escaped - as part of a project to raise them in captivity in Texas. A proposal by three Asian governments in the 1980s to export frozen kouprey embryos to U.S. zoos never advanced because no one could find any of the animals.

The last confirmed sighting by a Western scientist was in the 1960s. Civil wars in Cambodia during the 1970s and 1980s kept conservationists out of the country, and more recent searches failed.

Among the most infamous searches was one in 1993 led by American journalist Nate Thayer, who took an elephant caravan that included former Khmer Rouge guerrillas, an American mercenary and the publisher of Soldier of Fortune magazine.

They spent a fruitless two weeks looking for the ox, which grows to a height of about 6 1/2 feet and weight of 1,300 to 2,000 pounds.

"We never found the kouprey, but did come across Khmer Rouge soldiers who spotted us and fled, presumably to inform their commandeers of a group of white guys heavily armed in the area," Thayer said in an e-mail message.

Weiler, who took part in the DNA study with Galbreath, also led several unsuccessful expeditions in Cambodia from 1997 until last year. He hired elephant and tiger trackers and interviewed nearly 300 people to get leads. Despite vivid stories of the beast in the jungle, he never saw one.

"I came to the conclusion that the kouprey is extinct," Weiler said. "I've closed the book. It's possible three or four will pop up somewhere. But it's highly unlikely."

Not everyone agrees. The World Conservation Union still designates the kouprey as critically endangered and estimates there are less than 200 left in remote parts of Indochina.

"I think it's a little too early to give up hope. It is hard to prove something is extinct," said Simon Hedges, a wild cattle expert. "When you consider that new species are still being discovered in Indochina, I don't think it's entirely unrealistic to believe there might be pockets of species such as the kouprey living in the same area."

More controversial is the suggestion by Galbreath and his team that the kouprey should never have been listed as a species in the first place, theorizing it was likely bred as a domestic hybrid "to produce a strong animal that survives in difficult circumstances."

Calling it the most likely explanation based on the DNA testing, the animal's limited geographic range and its physical similarities to domestic cattle, Galbreath said that "it is surely desirable not to waste time and money trying to locate or conserve a domestic breed gone wild."

"The limited funds available should be used to protect wild species," he said.

But Galbreath has done little to change long-standing opinions among kouprey enthusiasts.

Alexandre Hassanin, a French scientist who along with Anne Ropiquet announced in 2004 that they had sequenced the kouprey DNA to show it was a natural species, said he disagrees with the paper.

The Cambodia government, which in the 1960s designated the kouprey as its national animal, has no plans to change that status.

"In my view, those researchers are not so sure either. If it was a hybrid, when did that happen?" said Yim Voeuntharn, Cambodia's deputy minister of agriculture. "There is no specific evidence."

Hedges, the wild cattle expert, calls Galbreath's findings "premature" and "counterproductive," saying it is wrong to discount the kouprey as a species based on such a small sample of DNA.

"If their analysis shows anything, it is that there are some hybrid banteng with kouprey ancestry," he said. "They don't show anything beyond that. They are arguing on very little information that the kouprey is a feral relic."

Galbreath agrees more DNA testing is needed and plans to take samples from banteng in other parts of Southeast Asia.

"For half a century, biologists have been complacent about this," he said. "Everyone fell in love with the idea that the kouprey was a natural species."


Associated Press writer Ker Munthit in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, contributed to this report.

Source: www.enn.com/today.html?id=11500.

[Melanie]

anotherspecialist said:

Northwestern Biologists Demote Southeast Asia's 'Forest Ox'

EVANSTON, Ill. --- It was one of the most famous discoveries of the 20th century. Shrouded in mystery since its recognition as a new species in 1937, the kouprey -- an ox with dramatic, curving horns -- has been an icon of Southeast Asian conservation. Feared extinct, it's been the object of perilous expeditions to the region's jungles by adventurers, scientists and journalists.

Now, in a paper published by the Journal of Zoology (London), Northwestern University biologists and a Cambodian conservationist present compelling genetic evidence that the kouprey may never have existed as a wild, natural species.

The researchers compared a published DNA sequence from the kouprey with sequences obtained from a true Cambodian wild ox, the banteng. The researchers had predicted, based on a study of kouprey anatomy, that the kouprey was a hybrid form and would show mitochondrial DNA similar to that of the banteng. The prediction was confirmed by their analysis.

The kouprey, which is now the national animal of Cambodia, may have originated as a domestic hybrid, between banteng and zebu cattle, that later became wild. (“Kouprey” means “forest ox” in the Khmer language.)

“The kouprey has acquired a rather romantic, exotic reputation,” said Gary J. Galbreath, senior author of the paper and associate director of Northwestern's Program in Biological Sciences. “Some people would understandably be sad to see it dethroned as a species.”

But, added Galbreath, “It is surely desirable not to waste time and money trying to locate or conserve a domestic breed gone wild. The limited funds available for conservation should be used to protect wild species.” Galbreath has been traveling to Southeast Asia studying its animals since 1999.

Ironically, Galbreath initially began his work in Southeast Asia in hopes of identifying a new species of bear. It turned out to be an undescribed golden color phase of the moon bear. He also was involved in the debunking of another alleged new species of hoofed animal, the “khting vor,” that was only known to science from specimens of its horns. Galbreath and others showed that these horns were the work of human artisans -- the “khting vor” was a fake.

Instead of finding new species, Galbreath said, “I've been involved in showing that two named species of large mammal may never have existed as such.” But, he notes, “In the end, good science is about what is true, not what is desired to be true.”

Galbreath hopes the paper will serve to focus conservation time, dollars and attention on real species that need saving. “The definitely real wild oxen of mainland Southeast Asia -- Banteng, Gaur, wild Water Buffalo -- could soon become extinct if more is not done to protect them from rampant poaching,” Galbreath said. “I hope that the publicity from the kouprey story can help make people aware of this problem.”

The other authors of the paper are John C. Mordacq, lecturer in the Program in Biological Sciences at Northwestern, and F. Hunter Weiler, a conservationist with the Wildlife Protection Office of Cambodia in Phnom Penh.

www.northwestern.edu/newscenter/stories/2006/09/kouprey.html

[Melanie]

peej2 said:

Does any one have some really good enlarged photographs of the kouprey that was at the Paris zoo...other than the nice big one allready on this link. I can only find small ones on the web...is there any other sites that may have larger photographs??

[Melanie]

anotherspecialist said:

At present all images we have found are posted here on this thread. As and when we find any others they will appear here.

[Melanie]

melanie said:

Cambodia's National Animal Never Existed, Scientists Say
Nicholas Bakalar
for National Geographic News
November 3, 2006

The national animal of Cambodia probably never really existed, a team of researchers says, at least in the scientific sense.

Since 1960 the Southeast Asian nation has claimed the kouprey—an ox with spectacular crescent-shaped horns and a dewlap under its chin—as its national symbol.

But after conducting genetic tests, a team of researchers from Chicago's Northwestern University has concluded that the animal was most probably not a unique species at all.

The researchers, led by Northwestern biologist Gary J. Galbreath, sequenced the genes of two wild oxen called banteng and compared them with a previously published DNA sequence of the kouprey.

"We're not sure what the kouprey was," Galbreath said. "What we're doing is opening up debate on this issue, a debate which hasn't really occurred in about half a century.

"There are five or six explanations for our data, but the explanation that fits the data best is that [the kouprey is] a domestic ox that went wild. We think the kouprey is almost certainly extinct, whatever it was."

History of a Hybrid?

The story of the kouprey seems to begin in 1940, when the Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology put on display what it described as a new species of ox.

The exhibit featured a mounted specimen of an animal shot in 1937 in what is now Cambodia. It was a bull ox, weighing almost a ton. A press report at the time described the creature as "the first new genus of large living mammals to be discovered since 1900."

The kouprey became so famous that in 1960 it was named the national animal of Cambodia, and over the years there have been vigorous efforts to preserve its diminishing numbers.

By 1996 it had been declared critically endangered, with an estimate of fewer than 250 left in the wild.

But the newspaper, and the conservationists, may have spoken too soon.

The Northwestern researchers compared mitochondrial DNA—a kind of DNA inherited only from the mother—and found that the kouprey's genetic makeup is so similar to that of the banteng that the most probable conclusion is that the kouprey is not a natural species at all.

Instead it is likely a feral form of a domestic animal, the scientists say, probably a hybrid of the mainland banteng and the zebu, strains of both of which are common among domestic oxen in Southeast Asia.


"We do know the mitochondrial DNA for the kouprey," Galbreath said. "If the kouprey was a domestic hybrid, our notion was to see if Cambodian banteng were similar to kouprey. And sure enough, as predicted, they were.

"[We] made a genetic prediction that most people wouldn't have believed correct, but we found that it was correct," he added.

The authors note that Cambodian farmers in the recent past reportedly used a kind of semi-feral ox to work in rice fields. This animal, the authors suggest, may have been the kouprey—living wild but still partially dependent on human contact.

"Considerable Debate"

The conclusion made by Galbreath and his colleagues is controversial, and some experts regard it as premature.

"There are several other scenarios that would explain their finding equally well," said Hans Lestra, associate professor of genetics at Utrecht University in the Netherlands.

"If the kouprey is of mixed-species origin, hybridization with domestic zebus is just one of the possibilities. Maybe, maybe not."

Lestra also argues that the team's study—which appears in the Journal of Zoology—doesn't live up to its title: "Genetically Solving a Zoological Mystery."

"No genetic mystery has been solved," Lestra said. "For this, additional research would be required, such as a comparison of paternally transmitted Y-chromosomal sequences of kouprey with those of banteng and zebu. However, Galbreath [and team] never analyzed any kouprey samples."

"By 'solving the mystery,' we mean making a step toward that," Galbreath responded.

"We're not claiming that an absolute conclusion can be come to at this point, but the most probable explanation is that this is an escaped domestic species."

Alexandre Hassanin of France's National Museum of Natural History says that the case remains unsettled.

In a paper still under review, he writes that "we need to … analyze banteng from Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam to give a definitive conclusion on the taxonomic status of banteng and kouprey."

Galbreath agrees that more data is needed.

"This is going to set off a considerable amount of debate," he said, "and that's part of our purpose. This is certainly going to stimulate people to obtain other kinds of genetic information from other wild cattle, particularly banteng.

news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/11/061103-cambodia-kouprey.html

[Melanie]

anotherspecialist said:

Very interesting but the mystery is still open not solved. I agree they need to do sampling of banteng in other areas to see if they match in anyway with the kouprey. We can't say that the banteng is a domestic strain bred in the past by crossbreeding with the kouprey or has breed in the wild with kouprey so you get a connection there.

[Melanie]

sebbe67 said:

There is six additonal photos in the lastest issue of www.birdlifeindochina.org/