May 18, 2016
Wild Cows Caught on Camera
- as seen by -Alys Granados
These may look like domestic cows, but these are wild cows called banteng (Bos javanicus), and they are an endangered species.
Banteng occur in tropical Southeast Asia, but like countless other species in this region, their numbers have declined, largely as a result of habitat loss, and also because they are hunted for their horns and meat.
As part of a study to determine how selective logging affects wildlife in tropical forests, we put up camera traps in logged and intact forest over three years in Malaysian Borneo. Our cameras photographed a variety of mammals but despite banteng being periodically seen in the area (sadly, not by me), we had never got any photos of them on any of our camera traps.
However, our luck changed in the final weeks of my final field season in the fall of 2015. We were lucky enough to get photos of not just one, but two banteng in an awesome series of photos of these individuals butting heads, just a few miles from camp.