Canis lupus hominis

As I have said before, I think the golden retriever always had a bit more coat than other strains of wavy/flat-coat because it was developed from dogs that lived in the Scottish highlands. That’s one of the reasons why the golden dumps so much hair during shedding season. However, in a functional retriever, the goal is find some balance between the protective coat and streamlining the body for the water or reducing the chances for the coat to collect brambles and burrs.

However, goldens are just one of several animals from Northern Scotland that have developed longer than normal hair. The Highland cattle, which have been in Scotland for far longer than golden retriever. In fact, they may have been in Scotland before the arrival of the Middle English dialects that would evolve into the Scots language.

These cattle evolved in rainy, cold Western Highlands as largely free range animals. These were not cattle that had access to the byres (a cow barn for you non- Scots speakers). Instead, it evolved this very thick coat and great big horns to fight off the wolves, which were common in Scotland well into the eighteenth century. (I remember reading that the Jacobites, who rose against the English crown, probably would have seen a wolf, but they probably would have never seen a rabbit, because European rabbits hadn’t colonized the Highlands.)

This animal is not entirely removed from the ancient Aurochs, the ancestral cattle of Eurasia, but this breed has also developed something of the bison’s coat. Like the bison, Highland cattle have very low fat content to their flesh.

What I also find interesting about them is that they come in roughly the same colors as the native cattle of the Scottish lowlands, which have a much broader distribution as beef produces. I am talking about the breed called the Aberdeen-Angus, which comes in red and black colorations. In the US cattle registry system, the breed is split into two breeds called the Red Angus and the Black Angus.

These are cattle for the byres. They are also from a lowland region in the eastern part of Scotland, where the weather is a little nicer. As a result, they didn’t develop the coat of the Highland cattle, but they did develop lovely marbled flesh. This is my favorite breed to eat.

Now, I don’t know whether any connection exists between the Highland cattle and the Lowland Aberdeen-Angus breed. However, they come in roughly the same colors. Their meat and musculature is quite distinct, as well as the obvious coat differences. Most Highland cattle have horns, while all Aberdeen-Angus are polled. But the fact that the evolved in relatively proximate areas does have my curiosity piqued. Is it possible that they have a common ancestor that was later bred for the different market and weather conditions in their respective regions?

I don’t know.

However, I do know that the red color in the Aberdeen-Angus is associated with a crossbreeding with now rare English longhorn cattle, an “improved” creation of Robert Bakewell, the first agriculturist to develop intensive selective breeding for livestock to increase production.

However, those two theories are not mutually exclusive. The English longhorn was brought in as an outcross, because the herds of Aberdeen-Angus type “doddies” were small.  Bakewell had increased the size of his cattle, and these animals were providing much larger beeves than the unimproved breeds of cattle. So why wouldn’t they cross the big ones in?

Keep in mind that the main person who standardized the Aberdeen-Angus was a man named Hugh Watson, who organized the breed from a landrace to a true breed in the early 1820’s. His main bull was “Grey-breasted Jock,” which tells you that the color varied a little bit.

However, I think that the Highland and Lowland Aberdeen-Angus are descended from a common ancestor that was black or red in color that later evolved into a different animal depending upon environmental conditions and market forces.

Now, if someone can provide me evidence that these two breeds couldn’t possibly be related, please send it my way. But  it does seem to me that the similarities in the two breeds in terms of color seems to me more than coincidental.

Oh, and in Scots, a cow is a “coo” or a “cou.” If you have more than one, then they are “kye.”