Water buffalo in the Northern Territory of Australia have a well defined breeding season in the wet or very early dry season. The birth of a calf is of major importance for the clan and for the family group of which that clan is a part. A number of calves are left in the care of an adult while their mothers go to graze. The female calf remains with its mother for many years, possibly for life, but at 2-3 y old the male calf is driven from the group by an adult bull when a cow in the group comes into oestrus. Most buffalo cows will readily adopt an orphan calf and within 8 days it is impossible to distinguish between the orphan and the group calves.Oestrus. The time when the cow willingly allows copulation. Metoestrus. A period following oestrus, characterized as in pro-oestrus. Dioestrus. No sexual desire observed. (Hafez does not use anoestrus in his paper.)
Regular aerial and land surveys of the coastal plains and adjoining high ground in the northern portion of the Northern Territory between the Adelaide and Wildman Rivers showed variations in the number of buffalo on the plains. When there were very few buffalo on the plains there were large numbers on the adjoining high timbered country.
During the wet season the plains flooded to varying depths and in those areas where the water was very deep all buffalo moved to higher ground. In the Northern Territory the wet season is the main breeding season, and at this time adult bulls were seen with cows in oestrus. During the dry season, which is the non-breeding season, the bulls and cows inhabited separate areas; the cows and their calves preferred those areas of the black soil plains adjoining high ground where there was water, shade, and some green feed. When rain fell at the end of the dry season, the buffalo moved to areas where it had rained.
Buffalo are very restricted in their movement and establish a very strong "site
attachment", i.e, they have a well-defined "home range". Inside this are a number of
"fixed points". Pathways, trails, or pads are numerous within each home range, and
run from one fixed point to another.
Because each animal exhibits this strong site attachment, many animals die each
year as the result of thirst, or starvation, or both.
It would appear that buffaloes wallow for two reasons: (1) when there is water about, all buffaloes
wallow at some time between 1000 and 1500 h; (2) when insect attack is severe, buffaloes will wallow
at any time, even at night. The location of the animal, whether in a wallow or in shade, does not
have any significant effect on the internal (rectal) temperature of the animal. In the present study,
the buffaloes' preference for wallows indicates that shade may not be as good as a wallow in lowering
body temperatures on hotter days.
Data were obtained on 1094 females and 859 males killed at an abattoir, and 135 females and 32 males shot in the field. The data indicated that cows calve during the late wet or early dry season, after a pregnancy of 10-11 months. Age at 1st conception averaged 28.5 months; puberty occurred at 14-19 months. Pregnancy rate was 76% for the abattoir sample; it was <5% for females aged less than or equal to 3 yr. Bulls were probably fertile for 8 months of the year, the infertile period occurring during the 2nd half of the dry season.
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