Just thought you all might like to hear what my dentist said yesterday about the Cape buffalo.

He said that the Cape buffalo knocks you down and then rolls over you to kill you. He smothers you and flattens you with his exhorbitant weight.

Just thought you might like to know that in case you ever see a Cape buffalo in the wild.

I expect the water buffalo might be gentle compared to the Cape buffalo.

a quite funny evolutionary development! wonder what the first one thought? "oops! how did that happen? sorry. hmmm. wonder if it's edible..."

I wonder how such behaviour is programmed into animals. I have seen on TV nature documentaries lions jumping on back of wildebeest, with one paw catching a leg low down to trip the prey, while other paw turned head to opposite side, so that when the pray animal fell, it would break its neck.
So I was fascinated to have a kitten hiding in low bushes pounce on my shin with same placement of paws, which would have made me fall if I hadn't been so much larger and heavier. Instead the kitten did a somersault.

Oh, wwh! I love your kitten story. And this would be the perfect moment to tell your racoon/dog story, which is about the best home animal story I've heard.

I should pull up some Cape buffalo photographs. Their size is breathtaking. Is breathtaking one word? Anyway, there are many images on Google where you see four or five men sitting in front of a Cape buffalo just so you can see how huge the beasts are. Somehow it makes me feel sympathy for the big buffalos as I see them lying there in the photographs dead.

Would we say that a buffalo is bovine? Or is that strictly limited to cattle? I don't expect we could, but I am curious. Is tsuwm around? Does he ever stop by here in the safari, I wonder?

Would we say that a buffalo is bovine?

Without citing any specific sources, and the whole thang gets a little complicated, the answer seems to be, yes. Bovine refers to your basic farm cow, ranch cow, buffalo, bison, yaks and a few other related beasties.

the Cape buffalo knocks you down and then rolls over you to kill you
Thus the origins of the verbing of buffalo [ouch!]

> Is tsuwm around? Does he ever stop by here in the safari, I wonder?

nope. never.
-ron

Well, that clarifies that, ron!

Thanks, Faldo, for the yak.