Kouprey - Bos sauveli

[Infinity Blade]

Kouprey: Bos sauveli


A kouprey (a young male) photographed in 1939 (update: see below for discussion on dates) at the Zoo of Vincennes, Paris. © @ Georges Broihanne->

Temporal range: Pleistocene[1] to Holocene epoch (~1.34 Ma to present or, if extinct, after 1969/70 CE[2])

Conservation status: Critically Endangered (possibly extinct)[2]

Scientific classification:

Life
Domain: Eukaryota
(unranked): Unikonta
(unranked): Opisthokonta
(unranked): Holozoa
(unranked): Filozoa
Kingdom: Animalia
Subkingdom: Eumetazoa
(unranked): Bilateria
Clade: Nephrozoa
Superphylum: Deuterostomia
Phylum: Chordata
Clade: Olfactores
Clade: Craniata
Subphylum: Vertebrata
Infraphylum: Gnathostomata
Clade: Eugnathostomata
Clade: Teleostomi
Superclass: Tetrapoda
Clade: Reptiliomorpha
Clade: Amniota
Clade: Synapsida
Clade: Eupelycosauria
Clade: Sphenacodontia
Clade: Sphenacodontoidea
Order: Therapsida
Suborder: Cynodontia
Clade: Prozostrodontia
Clade: Mammaliaformes
Class: Mammalia
Legion: Cladotheria
Sublegion: Zatheria
Infralegion: Tribosphenida
Subclass: Theria
Clade: Eutheria
Infraclass: Placentalia
Subcohort: Exafroplacentalia
Magnorder: Boreoeutheria
Superorder: Laurasiatheria
Clade: Ungulata
(unranked): Cetartiodactyla
Clade: Artiofabula
Clade: Cetruminantia
(unranked): Ruminantiamorpha
(unranked): Ruminantia
Infraorder: Pecora
Family: Bovidae
Subfamily: Bovinae
Tribe: Bovini
Genus: Bos
Species: B. sauveli

The kouprey is a relatively obscure, rare (possibly extinct) species of wild Bos that lives in the forests of Cambodia and the south of Lao People’s Democratic Republic.[2] Historically, its geographic range also included southeast Thailand and western Vietnam, but it is now known to be extinct in those countries.[2]

Taxonomy:
The kouprey was first named and described in 1937 by a French scientist (Achille Urbain). A calf was captured in Preah Vihear province, and kept at the Vincennes Zoo in Paris until 1940. Decades after its description, there was a paper that analyzed mitochondrial DNA that concluded that the kouprey is not a wild, natural species, but rather a feral hybrid between banteng (Bos javanicus) and zebu cattle (Bos taurus (or primigenius?) indicus). A subsequent analysis of DNA markers found that the kouprey is indeed a real, natural species, and that Cambodian bantengs had hybridized with koupreys during the Pleistocene epoch.[1]

Description:
The kouprey is a large bovid, allegedly weighing from 680 to 910 kg. Shoulder height was at 170 to 190 cm, while total body length was anywhere from 210 to 223 cm. While the body is enormous, it is also very narrow, with a hump on its back and long legs. The horns are wide reaching; in males they could be up to 80 cm in length with unusual frayed tips in individuals over 3 years old, while females have horns 40 cm in length that spiral upwards. Further sexual dimorphism is evident in the presence of dewlaps on the necks of males. Adult males are either dark brown or black, while females are more grey in color. Immature individuals start out with a reddish color, developing a grayish-brown coat by the time they are five or six months old. Koupreys can be further distinguished from bantengs or gaurs in having longer tails with bushier tips. The distal ends of their legs are white or greyish.[3]


Male (left) and female (right) koupreys, with a grown man for scale. © @ DFoidl->


A 1:22 scale model of a male kouprey. Created by Noemi D. Soos Creations->

Behavior:
Supposedly, koupreys have adapted to a nocturnal lifestyle to avoid humans, retreating into dense forest during the day, while coming out at night onto the grasslands to graze. The horns are used to dig and the males butt trees with their horns; this is what causes their characteristic fraying. Herds are made up of less than 20 individuals and are led by a single female. A herd can travel up to 15 km a night foraging on grass, salt licks, and water.[3]

Mating season is in the spring, and during the winter females give birth to a single calf after a gestation period of 8-9 months. Females temporarily leave the herd to give birth; after a month of protecting the calf in dense vegetation, females return to the herd with their offspring.[3]

Koupreys have apparently been recorded traveling in mixed herds with wild buffalo or bantengs.[3]


A herd of koupreys in a photograph. Taken from an archived webpage of ARKive->


Filmed footage of koupreys. This footage was shot in 1951 by Dr. Charles Wharton of Cornell University[4][5], and is the only existing footage of this species in the wild.[5]

Conservation:
Hunting is (or was, if the species is extinct) the major threat to koupreys throughout their range. These bovines are hunted for local consumption and for trade, both for meat and body parts (especially skulls and horns). It may also be possible that diseases transferred from domestic or free-roaming livestock could prove disastrous to the already impoverished kouprey populations. Habitat loss (for clearing land for cultivation), mining, logging, and other human disturbances are also threats, but insignificant compared to hunting.[2]

The last 30 years have seen an over 80% decrease in kouprey populations as a result of hunting. According to the IUCN, there are almost certainly less than 50 mature individuals left alive, and certainly less than 250 mature individuals, assuming the species has not yet gone extinct.[2]

The kouprey is currently listed by the IUCN as critically endangered (possibly extinct). The last published records of koupreys are from the 1960s to 1970. The IUCN claims that these observations are the last absolute confirmed recordings, with more recent sightings being unconfirmed. If that is the case, then there have been no confirmed recordings of the kouprey in half a century. Camera traps have been set up in the region including the kouprey’s geographic range; an assessment of 90% of these camera trap photos have revealed no images of koupreys. Extensive surveys of wild cattle populations in the former range of the kouprey reveal that the only place where wild cattle numbers remain high is eastern Cambodia. Wild cattle numbers are so low in most areas that there is no conceivable way that koupreys could survive in these parts. Further supporting this are the kouprey’s habitat specificity and the fact that its population densities were lower than that of the banteng. The IUCN states that “If a case were to be made for the continued existence of Kouprey it would focus on the fact that none of the landscapes assessed were sufficiently surveyed to rule out the presence of Kouprey because of the scale of effort required, which will be the case for the foreseeable future”. There are, in particular, two sets of camera trap photos from potentially significant parts of Cambodia that have not yet been examined.[2]

The IUCN considers the kouprey to most likely be extinct. The population continues to decline, if it is not already extinct.[2]

References:

[1] Hassanin, A., & Ropiquet, A. (2007). Resolving a zoological mystery: the kouprey is a real species. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 274(1627), 2849-2855.
[2] www.iucnredlist.org/species/2890/46363360
[3] sarkive.com/mammals/bos-sauveli/
[4] unomaha.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/p16383coll6/id/29/
[5] Dinerstein, E. (2013). The kingdom of rarities. Island Press.

[Infinity Blade]

A book from 1989 with some additional information (The Kouprey->).

• The kouprey is lighter in build than other wild cattle.
• Diet wasn't completely studied, but it did eat tall and short grasses (bamboo grasses, ploong grass, koom grass), sedges, leaves from trees & bushes, and mineral-rich soils.
• Kouprey have been hunted for decades, traditionally with large crossbows firing poisonous bolts on elephant-back. This continued for some time, but was mostly replaced by hunting with large bore flintlocks and military rifles.
• They may have once been domesticated in China.

[Infinity Blade]

At first I thought that this was a reconstruction of the horns of the kouprey, but there's a photo of what seems to be the specimen after it was killed. So I think these might be real. This-> is the image source.





The aforementioned photo of the dead specimen with the people who killed it.



Here is another image of a skull from the WWF's webpage (link->).



Turns out there are some other images of a live kouprey. This one of the first photographs of a kouprey taken in the wild. As you can see from the lyre-shaped horns, it's a female (image source->).



Another photograph of the individual pictured in the OP (image source->). I apologize for the small size.



Another individual sadly taken by hunters, and another live specimen photo (Hassanin, 2015). It's here that I've come across info conflicting with what I've found when researching for the OP. The OP picture is claimed by Wikipedia to date to 1937. However, the individual in Fig. 1D here is the same individual, just two years younger (when it first arrived). Fig. 1D is claimed by Hassanin to date to 1937 (when the kouprey was just two years old), with the OP pic thus dating to 1939.