Pinzgau Cattle

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A herd of Pinzgau cattle in the Alpes

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Pinzgau Cattle is a cattle breed from the Pinzgau in the federal state of Salzburg in Austria.

1 History
2 Characteristics
3 Population and performance
4 External links
5 Literature

[edit] History

The Pinzgauer cattle breed is most closely related to the North German lowland breeds, according to genetic and morphologic studies.

The Pinzgauer was first referred to as a breed in 1846, and prior to this, called "Pinzgauer False" or "Pinzgauer Schlag". They were originally bred for milk, beef, and draft work; and in the 19th century, they were bred into a strong stock for work at the farm, breweries, and sugar-beet areas. In its heyday, the Pinzgauer became the most popular cattle breed in Austria-Hungary, and it expanded through Eastern Europe. The Bavarian Pinzgauer Cattle Breeding association was founded in 1896. By December 1990, the population grew to 101,880 in Bavaria; but it subsequently collapsed as a result of industrialisation after World War II. Demand for the cattle decreased, and their breed was displaced by higher milk producing breeds like Fleckvieh cattle. By 1930, Bavaria had only 85,000 Pingzauer cattle.

The Pinzgauer breed has a genetically hornless type, the Jochberg Cattle. These cattle descend from a single, almost totally white calf that was born in 1834 in Tyrol. They were considered crippled and inutile because they could not put on a yoke. But nowadays Pinzgauer are not yoked, and the hornless breed is best adapted to modern husbandry. There are now fewer than 50 hornless Pinzgauer cattle in the world, so the type is endangered. Since 1988, there have only been two bulls at the insemination station near Salzburg.

[edit] Characteristics

The animals are auburn; a luscious chestnut-colour is the breeding purpose. Rarely, there are black animals; once upon a time these were seen as a curse. After 1900, black Bulls were removed from the breeding system, and the black colour vanished. All Pinzgauers have the breed-typical white pattern in common: a broad white stripe lengthwise along the whole back. The abdomen, chest, udder, and tail are white, too.

Cows: 600 - 700 kg, 137 cm Bulls: 1,000 - 1,100 kg, 147 cm

[edit] Population and performance

The Pinzgauer breed counts as endangered - the population decreases about 10 % per year.
In 2001 there were 360 animals in Germany, and worldwide there were around 1.3 Mio. In Austria there were 1995 53,874 animals, among them 9,883 cows registered in stud books.

Two conflicting tendencies caused the current status of rareness of purebred, high-performance animals.
The Pinzgauer is particularly bred as beef cattle in mother cow husbandry; so there is no breed selection on milk performance. But there are utility crossings with local or distinct beef breeds, too. In Austria itself, since 1969, Red Holstein have been crossed into to increase the milk performance. The aim is to achieve 6,000 kg milk with 4 % milk fat content and 3.5 % protein. The average milk performance in Austria is 5,356 kg milk with 3.89% milk fat and 3.28% protein (2005).

Although the Pinzgauer cattle also falls behind other breeds in the criteria of daily weight gain and grades, a special clientele admires the pronounced marbling of the beef. Anyway, the prices for calves and steers lie under the prices for other breeds. Breeding purpose for beef cattle is a daily weight gain of 1,300 g.