page_title: Water buffalo
section_title: In South America
hierarchical_section_title: Water buffalo / Distribution of populations / In South America
caption_attribution_description: Português: Búfalo da raça Murrah
context_page_description: The water buffalo or domestic water buffalo is a large bovid originating in the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia, and China. Today, it is also found in Europe, Australia, North America, South America and some African countries. The wild water buffalo native to South and Southeast Asia is considered a different species, but most likely represents the ancestor of the domestic water buffalo.
  Two extant types of water buffalo are recognized, based on morphological and behavioural criteria – the river buffalo of the Indian subcontinent and further west to the Balkans, Egypt, and Italy, and the swamp buffalo, found from Assam in the west through Southeast Asia to the Yangtze valley of China in the east. The origins of the water buffalo types are debated, although results of a phylogenetic study indicate that the swamp-type may have originated in China and was domesticated about 4,000 years ago, while the river-type may have originated in India and was domesticated about 5,000 years ago. After the domestication of the water buffalo in Southeast Asia, the swamp buffalo dispersed up to the Yangtze River valley between 3,000 and 7,000 years ago.
context_section_description: Water buffaloes were introduced into the Amazon River basin in 1895. They are now extensively used there for meat and dairy production. In 2005, the water buffalo herd in the Brazilian Amazon stood at roughly 1.6 million head, of which 460,000 were located in the lower Amazon floodplains. The breeds used include the Mediterranean from Italy, the Murrah and Jafarabadi from India, and the Carabao from the Philippines.
  During the 1970s, small herds were imported to Costa Rica, Ecuador, Cayenne, Panama, Surinam, Guyana, and Venezuela.
  In Argentina, many game ranches raise water buffaloes for commercial hunting.
caption: A Murrah buffalo on a Brazilian farm
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