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 Breeds of Livestock, Department of Animal Science |
Breeds of Livestock - Other Species
Other Species
In addition to those already listed there are a number of other species. The Poultry breeds link listed here will take you to a similar project for poultry. Poultry constitute a valuable source of protein for human diets in the form of both meat and eggs. They are well adapted for confinement and intensive systems of production. When produced in such systems, they offer minimum competition with humans for space and are even more efficient than the pig in converting high energy feeds, such as grain, into meat and eggs.
The domestic buffalo is descended from the wild water buffalo. The domestic buffalo are different somewhat from each other indicating that they are descended from various subspecies found in different parts of the world. Most of the domestic water buffalo of the world are found in the hot, wet areas of the world where rice is produced. They are extremely important in these areas, but are seldom found as agricultural animals in other parts of the world. Over 95% of the water buffalo are found in Asia and over one-half of the remainder are found in Africa, primarily Egypt.
Llamoids are members of the camel family native to the high elevations of the Andes Mountains. They consist of four species in two genera. Lama glama, the llama; Lama pacos, the alpaca; Lama guanico, the Guanaco; and Vicugna vicugna, the Vicuna. They will interbreed and do produce fertile hybrids.
The donkey is considerably smaller than the horse and therefore is not capable of carrying as heavy of loads as a horse. It is much more tolerant of hot, arid environments. In general, the donkey is more apt to be found than the horse in hot, dry environments where the agriculture is subsistence.
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