Black cows with white stripes are less likely to stomp their feet, wag their tails, or shake their heads to chase away flies than their counterparts.
Zebra-striped cattle in Japan. Photo: PLOS One
Farmers in Yamagata Prefecture, Japan, are painting cows with zebra-like stripes to repel blood-sucking insects, Interesting Engineering reported on March 18. The experiment is proving effective as the painted cows show less signs of stress than their counterparts.
Japanese Black cattle are one of four breeds used to produce high-quality wagyu beef in the country. However, they are suffering from harassment from blood-sucking insects such as horseflies and cattle flies. The stress caused by the insects is so great that some farmers say the fertility rate of their cattle has dropped.
To combat this, farmers in Yamagata have been using spray paint or a mild bleach to add white stripes to their black cows, making them look like zebras. This effort has been going on for more than three years. After seeing the improvement in the condition of their cattle, more farmers have adopted this low-cost method.
Local scientists observed painted and unpainted cows in agricultural areas, noting behavioral patterns such as tail wagging, head shaking, or stomping their feet to ward off flies. While unpainted cows performed these behaviors up to 16 times per minute, painted cows performed them just five times.
Local scientists have not shared details about the exact reason flies dislike striped surfaces. In 2019, a team of experts from the Aichi Agricultural Research Center in Nagakute City, Aichi Prefecture, Japan, conducted a study with six cows and published the results in the journal PLOS One . The study showed that cows painted with zebra stripes could avoid attacks from blood-sucking flies, but they did not conduct any experiments to determine the specific cause.
Farmers often rely on insecticides to deal with the problem. However, insects tend to develop resistance to insecticides within a decade or so, creating the need to develop new, more powerful insecticides. Striping is a cheaper, short-term solution that could evolve from the use of external marking paint to identify livestock.
Additionally, previous research has shown that striping cattle causes polarization of light, which makes it difficult to detect movement, preventing insects from slowing down enough to land on the animal. This method is therefore effective in preventing insect bites.
Thu Thao (According to Interesting Engineering )
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