Talk:Heck cattle

message: Have there not been an other more scientific attempt to “breed back” wild cattle?  I have heard of a project that used “Spanish fighting bulls and Corsican mountain cows”.  (This is my own translation from Swedish.  The breeds might not be called so in English.)  The result bore a physical resemblance to the Aurochs depicted in prehistoric art.  It might also be able to survive in the wild.  Something Heck cattle can’t according to Swedish historian Peter Englund.
2007-03-28 Lena Synnerholm, Märsta, Sweden.
: Hello Lena, I do not quite understand what you mean, I am sorry to say.
:1) The term "breed back" is a catch phrase; it is based on wishful thinking, on an illusion, at least in cases such as this when the creature is extinct. You can create "models", "look-alikes", that also may serve as "ecological aequivalents". That is all. And that is independent of your degree of scientific knowledge, or funds, or whatever; because it is in the nature of things.
:2) The breeds that you name were indeed part of the "raw materials" that the Heck brothers used, and their results were and are said to resemble cave paintings (Grzimek's Animal Life Encyclopedia, or other sources will tell you so). So what is the difference to the Heck cattle project (except that they were a bit more sophisticated, did not use just two breeds) ? It looks like you confused something, or you read about the same project, but the name was not mentioned, or you forgot it, or something like that. 
:3) Breeding does continue today, with modern knowledge and new and larger "primitive" breeds added (see the German language article by a German broadcaster that is linked to the article here). So the animals that were "created" in the 1920es are altered today so that they do resemble the Aurochs (itself extinct-for-ever) even more...
:4) Survive in the "wild" ? All Heck cattle are kept outdoors, all year round (at least in Germany) (except for a few individuals in zoos), even in Bavaria with 20 degrees minus or less in winter time (celsius scale). They even get sort of a winter fur (see beautiful photographs in GEO magazine, some issue in the 90es had a long article on Heck cattle). I do not know if they could today defend themselves against Siberian Bears, or lions (as true aurochs would have the "opportunity" to do in historic times). But wolves are coming back to Germany, and since the bulls stay with the herd all the time (unlike in domestic cattle that are allowed to graze in the open for a while) I do not doubt the herd would defend their calves succesfully against (almost) any wolf attack! So what else would you demand? Or what did your mister Englund have in mind ? Or why would an historian be able to make meaningful statements about this topic (I guess that was an error of yours when you provided a link to "historian" - which apparently does not need any explanation - instead of to his name; I corrected that in your statement above)? Where did he write that, what did he mean, did he bother to give any reason, did he strike you as knowledgeable about this issue ? Please enlighten me a bit !
:With Urus-loving regards, Sincerly
:Sophophilos: 147.142.186.54 (talk) 16:40, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Other attempt to breed wild cattle? 

message: I find the section of the article quite misleading. As an uninformed reader you may get the impression that this "somehow" was "a Nazi project". There is just one reference given, but that does not even mention, let alone deal with the breeding project. It is an article from the Berlin Zoological Garden yearbook of 2002 (in German, of course); written by a historian, it deals with political pressure to make the (very popular) zoo a "Jew-free area" (concerning questions of administration, shareholders' circle and admittance of visitors) after the NS regime came to power, and how the administration and board reacted to it. It shows that there was hesitation first, and then compliance with such demands, and after the war a complete lack of interest in dealing with that shameful chapter. - So far, no surprise. I know the zoo very well (I kept an annual ticket as a teenager), and I know the institute where the author works ("Institute for Research in Antisemitism", faculty of Humanities, Technical University, Berlin - a unique institution in this - state-run - large University in the German capital city) (because I spent the first two University terms of my life at that faculty). - So the zoo management gave in to political pressure by the Nazis. That is ugly, but seems almost inevitable in such circumstances: in any dictatorship you cannot be (openly) "anti-government" and keep your job. So you could become an opponent, personally, but then you would soon be replaced by someone else, who is not. It makes a difference from the point of view of personal ethics and morale, certainly, yes, but not from the point of view of institutional management (it is going to be streamlined very soon, anyway). The director was Lutz Heck. Apparently he was too willing to give in to pressure. That would paint him in a bad light as a human, if confirmed.
My understanding is that the two brothers worked together in this project, from the beginning, intellectually ( I do not know about finances and staff etc). All sources I read so far state that it was started in the early 1920es; that means in the midst of the troubled Weimar Republic aera. That means about a full decade before the Nazi regime was invited to power by an ill-guided ageing president. They were driven, I understand, by ideas of conservation biology, and probably nostalgia for "things ancient", and "things wild and untamed" or so. These are sentiments that were prominent in Germany since the Romantic age; and are still prominent in many circles both in Germany and other countries.
The Nazi goverment and their skillful propaganda wing usurped about everything and every element of German culture that would fit into their fantasies and plans, from classical music and German literature and archaeology to folk songs to adolescent hiking groups to nature conservation. I do not see why that would mean that those things "were" or "became" "inherently" "Nazi-affin" in any way. As far as I know, Hermann Goering was also an active supporter of the Wisent conservation project. Would that give the project itself (begun much earlier, and continued internationally until today) a "bad odour" ?
Probably the Heck brothers, as most other scientists and administrators in Germany in that time, were very naiv, or conservative, or perhaps even optimistically looking forward to the new rulers. They would probably become party members also - I guess everyone in a dictatorship who holds any sort of high office had to ( I know for certain that ordinary high school teachers in Nazi time Germany became highly suspicious when they did not; directors would certainly have benn forced, or removed from office; let alone anyone "more important" than a school head). They might have been even supporters in the core of their hearts, that could be so. But who knows that- any of you, without evidence ? There were all sorts of attitudes in those years.
Since this, the Nazi dictatorship, is a very ugly chapter, I request everyone, from whatever country, to be careful when making any statements. For this article that means, make a statement only when you are certain about it, and have good and clear evidence, that actually backs up your statement(s), and name that evidence, and be very careful with your wording, so that every reader will understand - without having to ask back again - what precisely you want to state and express with your words and what not.147.142.186.54 (talk) 16:14, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Alleged "NS-connection" to Heck project 

message: I think this article needs work. Citations are missing, and some of the citations in the article seem like they aren't up to the standards of verifiabilty. Linking to newspaper articles on History or Science that don't show their sources is generally unreliable. It creates a brick wall in the research chain. 
The 1920 start date for the Hellabrun breeding program of the Heck Cattle for instance, would seem to require a citation, as the start dates for breeding programs or other scientific endeavors are important for establishing priority in academic or intellectual property concerns. 
The second citation for instance, "Heute haben Sie wieder eine Carla im Zoo" Der Berliner Zoologische Garten und seine jüdischen Aktionäre, Monika Schmidt, Bongo, 9.4.2002is a broken link. And if you hunt around and dig up the article somewhere else (http://www.wernercohn.com/Resources/Bongo.pdf) it doesn't mention the Heck cattle specifically. It refers (as already pointed out) to pressure on the Zoo administration to accept Government directives in a context of the aryanisation of the Zoo's board of directors. The citation should support the following, "Lutz Heck, director of the Berlin Zoological Gardens, began extensive breeding programs supported by the Nazis during World War II to bring back the aurochs." That isn't to be found, either directly or indirectly in the article cited.  It appears simply not verifiable using the citation.   
Citation No.3, Fox News: 'Nazi Cows' Roam English Countryside is a highly edited abstract version of this article's first citation from The Times' A shaggy cow story: how a Nazi experiment brought extinct aurochs to DevonWhy would we cite two articles with exactly the same (one of them admittedly having rather abbreviated) content? This creates the rather misleading impression of verifiability by having "mulitple" sources. And since the sources themselves don't cite, we would seem to hit that unverifiable brick wall again. 
Robbie.johnson (talk) 08:33, 24 April 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Indeed, the English article doesn't hold a candle in form or citation compared with the French Article of the same topic. 92.12.110.140 (talk) 00:08, 26 April 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  The citations for this article really need work  

message: Is this really the most suited infobox? Regards, --Klemen Kocjancic (talk) 07:25, 2 March 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Infobox Person 

message: NOTHING about the Nazis? Is this a joke or just censorship? Bataaf van Oranje (talk) 22:35, 11 March 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wtf? 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Thanks for reverting my recent edits, that's very kind of you guys. The problem with the reference is that it is not a peer-reviewed printed paper that was officially published by Science, it was merely an e-letter as Science refused to publish it for good reason. It is full of unobjective, resentful critique and has the dubious message that it would be "unpredictable" if a ecologically native species is reintroduced in its habitat. Cattle are used in many conservation grazing projects where it has been shown that their grazing helps to maintain open and semi-open land biodiversity. Thus, adding that exclusively online published e-letter with its unobjective and not fact-based message is not an improvement of the article. I understand that the authors have a certain degree of resentfulness, but Wikipedia is not a platform for the resentiments of single individuals but is meant to be an objective encyclopedia. DFoidl (talk) 16:54, 3 March 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: You violated WP:3RR; please immediately undo your deletion. The material you deleted is referenced by a document written by several individuals with the credentials to comment on the subject in a different journal after Science apparently did not publish the letter there. The letter, as published in Organon, is not used to reference controversial statements but instead describes certain criticisms the have been held by opponents. The letter is also hosted on the Polish Academy of Sciences's website. The sum of the evidence here is that this material is fine and that the letter used to source it is reliable for this material. ~ Pbritti (talk) 17:43, 3 March 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: What they write is still wrong, so it should not be on Wikipedia. It's as simple as that, if Wikipedia is to be taken seriously. DFoidl (talk) 17:57, 3 March 2023 (UTC)
replies: text:  If these scholars have had their comments published in a journal and their published letter hosted on a university website, your assertion that  is insufficient to warrant the removal of the content. You must make specific arguments addressing the contents of the letter, the material referenced to the letter, and the individuals responsible for the letter using reliable sources. Otherwise, the content will eventually be reintegrated into the article. Additionally, you deleted another, different passage that I restored, apparently unaware of what you were deleting. If you believe that content should be excluded, please use reliable sources and Wikipedia policy to justify that position. ~ Pbritti (talk) 18:26, 3 March 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Recent deletion