Also Known By: Peasantry cows

 

The reasons for preserving the remnants of old native breeds are:

 

Culture/historical: These cattle were very important for agriculture Sweden in the past. It is as important to preserve old living domestic livestock, as it is to preserve old objects and buildings.

 

Nature conservation: These cattle are often hardy and well adapted for extensive production, i.e. good foragers and very active. This makes them well suited for grazing on fields and woods in national parks, etc.

 

Economy based on domestic production: In Sweden young families often want to move to the countryside to grow their own vegetables, produce milk and meat in an ecological way. They only need one or two cows and these cattle can be well suited for this purpose.

 

Living gene-bank: We keep these cattle as a living gene-bank, sort of a gene-stock to be used in the future if the breeding of modern breeds goes wrong.

 

Our society is quite unique, as we are approved as the Official Registrar of the so-called Peasantry Breeds of cattle in Sweden.

All our cattle are registered in an exclusive herd-book, which is handwritten. The herd-book is also installed on computer. Every animal is identity photographed and given a derivation certificate. One of our actual projects is to have all this information transferred to a CD-ROM disc. Every cattle owner signs a genebanks-contract, where he commits himself, among other things, not to crossbreed. The owner also gives an annual report of his cattle. We are participating in a blood-profile investigation of the breed and in sperm-collecting of valuable breeding bulls. For breeding we try to use as many bulls as possible.

 

 

References

Anette Eriksson, Luleå, Sweden