Gloucester cattle

Gloucester cow and calf

Gloucester cattle are a breed of dairy and beef cattle originating from Gloucestershire and surrounding areas in the West Country of England.

Description

They are large cattle, coloured a rich dark brown in the cows, calves and steers, and almost black in the bulls. They have a white belly and a white finching stripe along the spine and continuing over the tail, and they normally have well-developed white horns with black tips.

History

Cattle of similar type were numerous in the Cotswold Hills and the Severn Valley of England as early as the 13th century. They were valued for their milk (used for Gloucester cheeses), for providing strong and docile draught oxen and finally for their beef.

By 1972 only one significant herd remained and the breed was in danger of dying out. The Gloucester Cattle Society was revived in 1973 and the breed has moved from near extinction to being rated by the Rare Breeds Survival Trust as being "At Risk", as there are still fewer than 750 registered breeding females.^[1]

The milk of Gloucesters is well-suited to cheese-making, being high in protein and with high butterfat, in particularly small globules. Single Gloucester and Stinking Bishop cheeses are made exclusively from Gloucester cattle milk. Double Gloucester cheese may now be made from the milk of any cattle, although it was traditionally made from that of Gloucesters.

Glamorgan cattle, from the adjacent parts of Wales, are another rare breed of similar type with similar colouration.

References

↑ Rare Breeds Survival Trust watch list accessed 21 May 2008

External links

Livestock breeds of the British Isles

Cattle

Beef cattle	Angus Beef Shorthorn Belted Galloway Blue Grey Devon Dexter English Longhorn Galloway Hereford Highland Luing Shorthorn South Devon Sussex Welsh Black

Dairy cattle	Ayrshire Guernsey Jersey Milking Shorthorn

Dual purpose	British White Gloucester Pembroke Red Poll Shetland Whitebred Shorthorn

Primitive	Chillingham wild cattle Vaynol White Park cattle

Sheep

Extant	Beulah Speckled Face Bluefaced Leicester Border Leicester British Milk Cheviot Clun Forest Cotswold Dalesbred Derbyshire Gritstone Devon Closewool Devon Longwoolled Dorset Down English Leicester Exmoor Horn Galway Greyface Dartmoor Hampshire Herdwick Hill Radnor Kerry Hill Lincoln Llanwenog Lleyn Lonk Norfolk Horn Oxford Down Portland Romney Rough Fell Ryeland Scottish Blackface Shetland Shropshire Southdown sheep Suffolk Swaledale Teeswater Welsh Mountain Wensleydale Whitefaced Woodland Wiltshire Horn

Primitive	Boreray Castlemilk Moorit Hebridean Jacob Manx Loaghtan North Ronaldsay Soay

Extinct	Scottish Dunface

Pigs

Extant	Berkshire British Landrace British Lop British Saddleback Essex Gloucestershire Old Spots Hampshire Large Black Large White Middle White Oxford Sandy and Black Tamworth Welsh Wessex Saddleback

Extinct	Cumberland Grice Lincolnshire Curly-coated Small Black Small White Yorkshire Blue and White

Goats

Anglo-Nubian Bilberry British Alpine Golden Guernsey Irish

Poultry

Chickens	Cornish Derbyshire Redcap Dorking Ixworth Marsh Daisy Modern Game Modern Langshan Norfolk Grey Old English Game Old English Pheasant Fowl Orpington Rosecomb Scots Dumpy Scots Grey Sebright Sussex

Ducks	Abacot Ranger Aylesbury Orpington Khaki Campbell Magpie Shetland Welsh Harlequin

Geese	Brecon Buff Shetland

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