I was wondering if cows, or other animals for that fact can get hypothermia?
I’m in the end of a rather brutal cold snap (-25 degrees celsius) and drove by some cows in a field. Are they at risk for getting hypothermia?
MtM
To put it simply, yes.
Some animals tolerate it better than other types. For instance at the Lincoln Park Zoo the Flamingos are rarely taken in as they are from Chilie and their home environment is cold.
So yes all animals can freeze but depending on their coat, their fat levels (look at seals in the cold cold ocean) they have different temp levels. Even differnt breeds of dogs. The little fufu type dogs need a sweater but the big old Eskimo dogs have enuff coat to keep them warm.
Yes. Consider: cows have been so domesticated over the centuries that they need human intervention to stay alive (In the same way, corn has been changed so heavily by selective breeding that, while tastier than its ancestors, it can’t grow on its own in the wild). Bison, often referred to as buffaloes, are another matter; essentially, bison are to cows as wolves are to dogs: smarter, tougher, healthier, and, as several bison farmers found out to their chagrin, more aggressive and tough to handle. Their heavy winter coat allows them to survive even tough winters.
Art
That said, even bison/wolves/polar bears will die of hypothermia if the conditions are extreme.
“Consider: cows have been so domesticated over the centuries that they need human intervention to stay alive (In the same way, corn has been changed so heavily by selective breeding that, while tastier than its ancestors, it can’t grow on its own in the wild).”
Not true. All breeds of cattle are perfectly capable of surviving and reproducing in the wild. There are feral herds of cattle in Australia, New Zealand, Japan and Hawaii as well as many other places. Over most of the planet cattle are raised in semi-feral situations with human interference limited primarily to predator control.
Art, I’m gonna pick a bone with you on your post. Please dont misunderstand me and take it as a flame, that is not how I intend it to come across at all. I would like to see some sort of cite on the presumption that cattle NEED human intervention to stay alive due to domestication. I really dont see any basis for that conclusion and I base my theory on a lifetime of ranching in New Mexico and the history of the Spanish cattle that were released/escaped over the centuries spanning the time of the Spanish conquest of North America to the advent of barbed wire.
During this time cattle roamed free and thrived in Mexico and the southern/southwestern part of the US pretty much with little or, in some cases, no human intervention.
Take out the barbed wire fences and allow cattle to roam freely so that they can find grass, water and migrate to warmer or cooler climates if necessary, I’m sure that they would survive and do just fine. Sure, there would be a die off of the weaker animals, but the species as a whole wouldn’t just disappear from the face of the earth.
I’ve seen this idea before and I’m pretty well convinced that it stems from people who’se experience is limited to very small operations or dairy type cattle and really dont know much about range cattle and western cattle ranching at all.
To answer the question in the OP, a cow can stand very cold temperatures as long as it can stay dry and if it does get wet it’ll need some sort of shelter from the wind, such as trees or brush and if it can get something to eat it’ll make it through the cold weather just fine.