When it comes to this representative of the fauna, there is often a certain misunderstanding of the issue. The fact is that in a number of authoritative sources it is stated that the tour is an extinct animal. And here is information about the range of its modern habitat. But everything is easily explained when it becomes clear that the same name refers to completely different types of animals.
Ancestor of Pets
The sad historical fact is that the animal that the poet Vladimir Vysotsky mentioned in his early song: "Either a buffalo, or a bull, or a tour" is an animal really extinct. This fact has been established and documented in a number of historical sources. The last tour on Earth died in 1627. Until that moment, their small herd was kept in the royal hunting grounds near Warsaw. It was this circumstance that made it possible to determine with such accuracy the date of the disappearance from the face of the earth of the relic ancestor of modern cattle. All domestic animals of this species originated precisely from this wild bull, which now does not exist in nature. But today the tour is presented only in the expositions of some zoological museums in the form of reconstructed skeletons and skulls. But even such remains give a very clear idea of howthis animal looked like in reality. He looked very impressive.
What we know about the tour
Studying the bone remains and preserved graphic images, we can conclude that the tur is an animal a little less than two meters tall and weighing about eight hundred kilograms. Its habitat covered the entire middle strip of the Eurasian continent from the Iberian Peninsula to the Pacific Ocean. It was a powerful muscular beast with large and sharp horns, dominating other representatives of the fauna. If we exclude a person, then he had practically no natural enemies in nature. Both hunting for it and the catastrophic reduction of relict forests, which are its natural habitat, led to the disappearance of this species. At present, the tour is an animal, rather, a mythological one. Its image is present both on medieval heraldry and on the arms of some modern states and autonomous territories. The image of a wild bull, or tour, is widely represented in the folklore and mythology of many peoples of Europe and Asia.
Spanish bulls
In the ritual of the Spanish bullfight, which has remained unchanged since the early Middle Ages, in addition to the bullfighter, the main character is a bull. It so happened historically that of all the representatives of large horned animals, it was the Spanish bull that most preserved the features of the relic tour. Currently, even a number of biological experiments are being carried out aimed at the revival and restoration of the natural population.tour. It is planned to apply gene technologies and clone the round using DNA molecules isolated from its bone remains. It is too early to talk about the results of this bold project, but it cannot be ruled out that sensational news from the field of zoology awaits humanity in the near future.
Mountain tour
And another horned representative of the fauna was much more fortunate. In any case, there is no direct threat of extermination for him yet. The point here is a simple coincidence of names. Just like a relic bull that disappeared from the face of the earth, in zoology a whole genus of mountain goats is called, of which there are a total of eight species. So it's a completely different tour. The animal, whose photo adorns many zoology textbooks, lives on steep, hard-to-reach mountain slopes. And, despite the poaching hunt for him, so far he is not going to die out. Mountain goats live in many regions of Eurasia and North Africa. They are distinguished by unpretentiousness in food and the ability to survive in the most difficult environmental conditions. No one can compare with them in their ability to move at high speed along an almost sheer surface.
On the slopes of the Caucasus
Mountain goats also have their authorized representatives on the territory of the Russian Federation. The Caucasian tour is widely known. This animal lives in a remote part of the region, mainly in the area of the Russian-Georgian border, and has two varieties: West Caucasian and East Caucasian. Sometimes itcalled the Caucasian mountain goat. In recent years, there have been alarming trends in the existence of these species. Their population has declined markedly, and this fact requires the adoption of vigorous legal measures aimed at protecting animals from poaching extermination. However, due to the complexity of the situation in many regions of the Caucasus, it is not so easy to implement environmental protection measures in practice. It is not enough to enter an endangered animal in the International Red Book, it is also necessary to ensure a real regime for its protection.
