Mating Behaviour Of Cattle How It May Influence Decisions About Treatments Such As Dehorning And Castration

As the cow reaches oestrus the bull becomes very excited and follows her closely, licking and smelling her external genitalia and often exhibiting phlegm. Recent work has shown that the bull uses the tongue to transfer fluid (probably urine) to a short incisive spur located on the dental pad. It is then transferred to the vomer-nasal organ (Jacobs et al., 1980) which is considered to be the site of pheromone identification. Pre-copula Tory patterns include pawing the ground and snorting, chin resting on the cow’s rump just before mounting and then copulation. Copulation is short (seconds) compared with horses and pigs (minutes).

The female becomes hyperactive when oestrus begins, and the number of indiscriminate agonistic interactions and mounting attempts increases. A subjective measure of the intensity of oestrus from how ‘excitable’ a cow seems to be, can be designated as strong, medium or weak.