RARE BREEDS TRUST OF AUSTRALIA
powered by TidyHQCATTLE: Adaptaur
CATTLE: Adaptaur
Country of Origin
Australia
Australian Status
LOST
Uses
Beef
Breed Traits
The cattle were medium sized, with slick dark-red coats, and well pigmented eyes. The slick coat assisted with tick and fly resistance as the slickness makes it harder for them to attach. The dark eye pigmentation increased their resistance to sun-burn. A gene also occurred which gave some of the cattle nearly 100% resistance to ticks. The breed was developed for a 550-day live weight at 18-20 months.
History
The Adaptaur was a tropically developed Bos Taurus originally bred at the former CSIRO Nat
ional Cattle Breeding Station at Belmont Station near Rockhampton, Queensland in the 1950s. It was one of the “breeding performance recorded” cattle, where weight gain, resistance, and growth rates were tracked over a period of time. The breed was developed with crosses of Hereford and Shorthorns.
Besides weight and growth, other performance indicators tracked over time were tick and internal parasite resistance, adaptability to heat, and ability to do well with seasonal nutrition under tropical conditions and stresses. A bull near Kalapa, Queensland was artificially infested with over 10,000 ticks, and proved to have nearly 99% resistance.
Famous enough to have had a wine named after them (Adaptaur Reserve Barossa Valley Shiraz), and to have been an animal in the online FarmVille game (for completing the Australian Pasture content of course!), industry uptake of the Adaptaur was poor, and the last known remaining cow was living out her life at a property in Biloela in 2007. In 2019 CSIRO auctioned off the remaining semen straws they held.
Photo Credits:
Top: Last known living Adaptaur Cow from Queensland Country Life, April 3 2024
Middle: CSIRO auction catalogue, 2019
Bottom: FarmVille Adaptaur from FarmVille Fandom Wiki
Page by Carol Wormald, October 2025
