Modern Cattle Can Be Traced Back to One Herd About 11,000 Years Ago

There is a lot of love for cow meat in America, where the average person consumes 55lbs of beef annually. While there were herds of animals like aurochs in the past, our modern cow as we know it did not exist in the wild, thus our ancient predecessors never experienced that pleasure. Our current global cow family can be traced back to a herd of 81 female animals that were bred over 11,000 years ago.

European researchers examine DNA samples acquired from both living cattle and bones taken from ancient places that date back to the origins of farming as we know it. Only if the initial herd was capped at a size of roughly 80 animals that came from the old aurochs, which was somewhat similar to a modern cow but not precisely the same thing and definitely considerably bigger and wilder, could the genetic distinctions shown in current cattle have existed.