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Biology: inbred cattle don't look bad at all.


A herd of feral feral

untamed; often used in the sense of having escaped from domesticity and run wild.
 cattle in northern England Northern England, The North or North of England is a rather ill-defined term, with no universally accepted definition. Its extent may be subject to personal opinion and many companies or organisations have differing definitions as to what it constitutes.  may be a rare example of how a tiny group can overcome the dangers of in-breeding. This Chillingham herd, now with 49 members, probably hasn't welcomed new genes for 300 years. In long-term isolation of some other species, harmful mutations have degraded reproductive success.

However, the Chillingham herd seems to have a history of healthy calving calving

act of parturition in a bovine female, and presumably in any animal that bears a calf as its newborn. See also block calving, ease of calving.


calving-to-conception interval
, say Peter Visscher of the University of Edinburgh (body, education) University of Edinburgh - A university in the centre of Scotland's capital. The University of Edinburgh has been promoting and setting standards in education for over 400 years.  and his colleagues. In the Jan. 18 NATURE, they report that genetic analysis shows greater uniformity than in any other known cattle herd. The scientists suggest that the homogeneity came from a natural purging of harmful mutations, as carriers died or failed to reproduce. Since disease resistance in mammals appears to rely on inherited differences, the researchers look forward to further study of this uniform cattle herd.

--S.M
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Copyright 2001, Gale Group. All rights reserved. Gale Group is a Thomson Corporation Company.

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Title Annotation:genetic closeness of feral cattle herd in England
Publication:Science News
Article Type:Brief Article
Geographic Code:4EUUE
Date:Feb 10, 2001
Words:141
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