The wild yak (''Bos mutus'') is a large, wild bovine native to the Himalayas. It is the ancestor of the domestic yak (''Bos grunniens'').
Taxonomy
The ancestor of the wild and domestic yak is thought to have diverged from '' Bos primigenius'' at a point between one and five million years ago. The wild yak is now normally treated as a separate species from the domestic yak (''Bos grunniens'').
Description
The wild yak is among the largest extant bovid species. Adults stand about tall at the shoulder, and weigh . The head and body length is , not counting the tail of .Han Jianlin, M. Melletti, J. Burton, 2014, Wild yak (Bos mutus Przewalski, 1883), Ecology, Evolution and Behavior of Wild Cattle: Implications for Conservation, Chapter 1, p.203, Cambridge University Press The females are about one-third the weight and are about 30% smaller in their linear dimensions when compared to bull wild yaks. Domesticated yaks are somewhat smaller.
They are heavily built animals with a bulky frame, sturdy legs, and rounded cloven hooves. To protect against the cold, the udder in females and the scrotum in males are small, and covered in a layer of hair. Females have four teats. Both sexes have long shaggy hair, with a dense woolly undercoat over the chest, flanks, and thighs for insulation against the cold. In males especially, this undercoat may form a long "skirt" that can reach the ground. The tail is long and horse-like, rather than tufted like the tails of cattle or
bison
Bison are large bovines in the genus ''Bison'' (Greek: "wild ox" (bison)) within the tribe Bovini. Two extant and numerous extinct species are recognised.
Of the two surviving species, the American bison, ''B. bison'', found only in North Ame ...
. The coat is typically black or dark brown, covering most of the body, with a grey muzzle (although some wild golden-brown individuals have been reported). Wild yaks with gold coloured hair are known as the wild golden yak (). They are considered an endangered subspecies in China, with an estimated population of 170 left in the wild.
Two morphological types have been identified, so-called ''Qilian'' and ''Kunlun''.
Distribution and habitat
Wild yaks once ranged up to southern Siberia to the east of
Lake Baikal
Lake Baikal (, russian: Oзеро Байкал, Ozero Baykal ); mn, Байгал нуур, Baigal nuur) is a rift lake in Russia. It is situated in southern Siberia, between the federal subjects of Irkutsk Oblast to the northwest and the Repu ...
, but became extinct in Russia around the 17th century. Today, wild yaks are found primarily in northern Tibet and western Qinghai, with some populations extending into the southernmost parts of Xinjiang, and into Ladakh in India. Small, isolated populations of wild yak are also found farther afield, primarily in western Tibet and eastern Qinghai. In historic times, wild yaks were also found in Bhutan, but they are now considered extinct there.
The primary habitat of wild yaks consists of treeless uplands between , dominated by mountains and plateaus. They are most commonly found in
alpine tundra
Alpine tundra is a type of natural region or biome that does not contain trees because it is at high elevation, with an associated alpine climate, harsh climate. As the latitude of a location approaches the poles, the threshold elevation for alp ...
with a relatively thick carpet of grasses and sedges rather than the more barren
steppe
In physical geography, a steppe () is an ecoregion characterized by grassland plains without trees apart from those near rivers and lakes.
Steppe biomes may include:
* the montane grasslands and shrublands biome
* the temperate grasslands, ...
country.
The wild yak was thought to be regionally extinct in Nepal in the 1970s, but was rediscovered in Humla in 2014. This discovery later made the species to be painted on Nepal's currency.
Behaviour and ecology
The diet of wild yaks consists largely of grasses and sedges, such as '' Carex'', '' Stipa'', and '' Kobresia''. They also eat a smaller amount of herbs,
winterfat
''Krascheninnikovia'' is a genus of flowering plants in the subfamily Chenopodioideae of the family Amaranthaceae known as winterfat, so-called because it is a nutritious livestock forage. They are known from Eurasia and western North America. Th ...
shrubs, and mosses, and have even been reported to eat
lichen
A lichen ( , ) is a composite organism that arises from algae or cyanobacteria living among filaments of multiple fungi species in a mutualistic relationship.Himalayan wolf, but Himalayan black bears,
Himalayan brown bear
The Himalayan brown bear (''Ursus arctos isabellinus''), also known as the Himalayan red bear, isabelline bear or Dzu-Teh, is a subspecies of the brown bear and is known from northern Afghanistan, northern Pakistan, northern India, west China an ...
s and snow leopards have also been reported as predators in some areas, likely of young or infirm wild yaks.Thubten Jigme Norbu, the elder brother of the
, reported on his journey from Kumbum in Amdo to Lhasa in 1950:
Wild yaks are
herd
A herd is a social group of certain animals of the same species, either wild or domestic. The form of collective animal behavior associated with this is called ''herding''. These animals are known as gregarious animals.
The term ''herd'' is ...
animals. Herds can contain several hundred individuals, although many are much smaller. Herds consist primarily of females and their young, with a smaller number of adult males. On average female yaks graze 100m higher than males. Females with young tend to choose grazing ground on high, steep slopes. The remaining males are either solitary, or found in much smaller groups, averaging around six individuals. Groups move into lower altitude ranges during the winter. Although wild yaks can become aggressive when defending young, or during the rut, they generally avoid humans, and may flee for great distances if approached.
Reproduction
Wild yaks mate in summer and give birth to a single calf the following spring.Wiener, G.; Jianlin, H.; Ruijun, L. (2003) "4 The Yak in Relation to Its Environment" ''The Yak, Second Edition''. Bangkok: Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, . Accessed 8 August 2008. Females typically only give birth every other year.
Conservation
The wild yak is currently listed as
Vulnerable
Vulnerable may refer to:
General
* Vulnerability
* Vulnerability (computing)
* Vulnerable adult
* Vulnerable species
Music
Albums
* ''Vulnerable'' (Marvin Gaye album), 1997
* ''Vulnerable'' (Tricky album), 2003
* ''Vulnerable'' (The Used album) ...
on the IUCN Red List. It was previously classified as Endangered, but was downlisted in 1996 based on the estimated rate of population decline and current population sizes. The latest assessment in 2008 suggested a total population of no more than 10,000 mature individuals.
The wild yak is experiencing threats applied by several sources. Poaching, including commercial poaching, has remained the most serious threat; males are particularly impacted because of their more solitary habits. Disturbance by and interbreeding with livestock herds is also common. This may include the transmission of cattle-borne diseases, although no direct evidence of this has yet been found. Conflicts with herders themselves, as in preventive and retaliatory killings for abduction of domestic yaks by wild herds, also occur but appear to be relatively rare. Recent protection from poaching particularly appears to have stabilized or even increased population sizes in several areas, leading to the IUCN downlisting in 2008. In both China and India, the species is officially protected; in China it is present in a number of large nature reserves.
Impact on humans
The wild yak is a reservoir for zoonotic diseases of both bacterial and viral origins. Such bacterial diseases include
anthrax
Anthrax is an infection caused by the bacterium ''Bacillus anthracis''. It can occur in four forms: skin, lungs, intestinal, and injection. Symptom onset occurs between one day and more than two months after the infection is contracted. The sk ...