Holy cow: scientists plan to resurrect the mighty aurochs, extinct king of the bulls

A tall, heavy beast with long, forward-curving horns faced down a smaller bull. Its head was held high as if in challenge. The smaller animal seemed to recoil in submission. Even the cave lion, the largest of predators, looked unlikely to challenge the dominant bull. Behind them a herd of giant deer ran from unseen danger.

This scene was depicted in a painting on a cavern wall at Lascaux, France, 17,000 years ago. Megaloceros, the giant deer in the background, are extinct. The cave lion is extinct. The bulls - a species called aurochs (pronounced “aur-ox”) - have disappeared, too. Their genes, however, are still present in modern cattle, and scientists have been trying to bring them back to life.

The Taurus Program, a partnership of ecologists, geneticists, historians and cattle breeders backed by Stichting Taurus, a Dutch nonprofit, is seeking to re-create the aurochs by crossbreeding modern cattle in a process known as back breeding. Laboratory-based genetic engineering is not required.

The program’s scientists have identified breeds of cattle that share characteristics with their auroch ancestors: large stature, long legs, a slender and athletic build, horns curving forward, black coats in the males and reddish brown ones in females. The back breeding began in 2008 with seven varieties crossed.

“What’s kind of surprised me is the low-hanging fruit that’s quite easy to get at,” said Ronald Goderie, an ecologist who directs the Taurus project and is co-author of the book The Aurochs: Born to Be Wild.

“What you see already in the second generation is that the coloration of the animal is very aurochs-like. The bulls are black and have an eel stripe [along the spine]. They’re already higher on the legs. What’s more complicated is the size and shape of the horns. I would say that in some cases you can see an individual animal is 75 per cent of where we need to get at. . . . We think in six, seven generations we will get a stabilised group of Taurus cattle. That will take us another seven to 10 years.”

The Taurus project was formed as part of the “rewilding” conservation movement. Rewilding involves the restoration of large tracts as much as possible to their pre-human state. This often entails reintroducing key animals and plants that had disappeared.