Do cows really make up the majority of vetebrate biomass on the planet?

I’ve seen a "fact“floating round the internet claiming cattle make up 80% of vertebrate biomass on the planet, and though this is hard to believe, I’m wondering if they make up the majority of it, after all, they are pretttay big and there are hundreds upon hundreds of millions of them.

If the figures on wikipedia Biomass page are right then nowhere near 80 percent of vertebrate biomass.

marine fish is much higher total global biomass than cattle. If you restrict it to land vertebrates then cattle is the single largest species but it’s still not 80 percent. cattle looks like it might be very roughly 40 percent of land vertebrates but the figures on wiki are incomplete.

Based on what I see, I bet they are outmassed by Canada Geese, pigeons or seagulls just based on population.

Is that even remotely possible?

Hundreds of millions is actually a low estimate. It is estimated there are approximately 1.4 billion cattle worldwide.

Is this just domestic cattle, or all bovidae, from Gaur to Antelope?

Wah! Don’t have a cow man! :slight_smile:

The “fact” went as follows;

Mountain Gorilla: Highly intelligent, collectivistic, extremely strong. Endangered.
**Lions: **Strong, athletic, powerful pack hunters. Endangered.
Cows: Incredibly stupid. Unable to care for themselves in nature. Tastes delicious. Composes 80% of all the vertebrate biomass on earth

There’s 7 billion humans, and they weigh something like 100 lbs a piece. There’s something like a billion cows and they weigh ~1,000 pounds a piece. So its pretty clear that cows aren’t even 80% of the human-cow biomass, nevermind that of all vertebrates.

nm

Hmm. A good math problem would be to figure out which species has greater total biomass – cattle or humans.

We once had a debate on these boards (long ago) whether any single species on earth had ever achieved greater total biomass than humans. Looks like cattle could give us a run for our money.

It wouldn’t surprise me if the Bovidae were responsible for 80% of the vertebrate biomess on land. :smiley:

And I think that the statement under question must be excluding aquatic creatures.

You do? If I do a google search for that, this thread is the only hit that has that claim in it.

I’m guessing you are remembering incorrectly, even if what you have seen is wrong.

Lions also aren’t technically endangered. The IUCN lists them as “vulnerable”, a step above “endangered”.