Travel in China

[HOSS]

Well I leave Monday for my umpteenth trip to China. I go 4 or 5 times per year on business. This time I hope to be able to see a Chinese cattle operation. I have one of our trading partners checking it out. I have driven through the countryside all over several provinces and have yet to see more than two bovine type creatures in one place. These appeared to be water buffalo grazing along the dykes of rice paddies. There is a herd of wild cattle in the New Territories area of Hong Kong. I have seen them from the train but they are becoming extinct I think. They appear to be multi-colored, smaller framed cattle with horns. I have no clue as to the breed mixture. I have seen farmers leading their water buffalo's down the interstate by a rope attached to the ring in their nose. I see plenty of pigs and chickens but few cows. I hope that changes this time around

 

[Gale Seddon]

Wow, lucky you! Hope you will share what you learn when you return (and pictures too!!!). What a great opportunity, even if you have to work while traveling. Have a safe trip!

 

[dj]

HOSS,
I read a couple of years ago that their average herd size was 1.3 or 1.4 AU. And most farmers were doing well enough to consider doubling the herd size. I guess that would be to 2 AU.
While you over there see what the interest in corrinette(sp) cows is about. That one fella seems to be in hurry to find out about them. I wonder if the rodeo will fascinate them like it did the Japenese.

 

[rkm]

I was just wondering, will you be allowed take pictures?

 

[HOSS]

I have never been questioned or stopped when I wanted to take a picture. I do use common sense and do not attempt pictures of infrastructure such as the nuclear power plants or military bases that I pass. I will try and get some cow pics

 

[HOSS]

Greetings from Ningbo, China. It is 9:20 at night here and ya'll are just getting ready for church. Good news is I did get to see some cows today. Bad news is that my camera battery was dead. We had a flat tire from a sharp rock on a back road. While the driver was changing the tire I wandered down the road for a couple hundred yards and saw a small herd of cattle (about 6 animals) that looked heavily brammer or some other india / africa breed. Not large cattle but with the classic brammer hump and loose brisket skin. Dark red color with white around the nose like a jersey. They are polled. They use them as draft animals to pull plows in the rice paddies. They loop a strap over the hump and attach that to the plow. Interesting thing is that there were no fences and it looked like the cattle were grazing on the crops. I saw this in several places along that road. The same thing applied to the water buffalo that I saw. It appears to me that they would eat up the profits from growing the crops if they grazed on it. Any way I will be doing some more travelling in the next 3 days and I will try and get some pics. I'll check back in by the weekend.