Publication details
Alignment of cattle: replication study
| Authors | |
|---|---|
| Year of publication | 2012 |
| Type | Conference abstract |
| MU Faculty or unit | |
| Citation | |
| Description | Recently, with the aid of Google Earth application, evidences of prevailing North-South body orientation of cattle on pastures were reported. However, consequent study of different laboratory did not confirm this phenomenon. The aim of our study was to verify independently this remarkable animal behaviour. We evaluated more than 80 herds (more than 2300 animals). Persons evaluating animal positions were not aware of actual orientation of the pictures. Rayleigh test of clustering of mean vectors calculated for herds showed significant preference of 3/183 axis (P=0.005). Positions of main axis of individual cows were also significantly clustered around 359/179 axis (P << 0.01). Our results are in line with original findings of prevailing North-South orientation of grazing cattle. |