Cow Breeds at GEV Goshala

The Tharparkar breed:

Earlier India had 120 indigenous breeds of cows. The number is now reduced to 30. Tharparkar is one of the pure indigenous breeds. It originally comes from the Sindh region of Pakisthan. After the partition, they have crossed the Thar Desert to come to Jaiselmer, Badmer and Jodhpur regions in Rajasthan, and also along the Kutch border of Gujarat. And now these cows are the native of those regions in India. Since “they crossed the Thar desert”, they are called as Tharparkar.  They are well known as a dual purpose breed – for milk and agriculture.

The Gir breed: 

Understanding the importance of giving pure cow milk to the residents of GEV and the Gurukul kids, the Goshala brought Gir cows from Swami Narayana Goshala. In December 2009, the Goshala brought 4 cows and 1 breeding bull along with a bull calf from Swami Narayana Temple, in a place called Swami nagadhada in Rajkot district of Gujarat. Gir is basically a milk breed. Its bulls are not as efficient as Tharkar bulls for Farming. But can be engaged for other cottage industry applications – ADPM, oil Ghani, etc.

 The Dangi breed:

They are from Ahmadnagar and Nasik districts of Maharashtra. This breed has excellent working qualities in heavy rainfall areas, rice fields and on hilly tracts. It’s a Draught breed. Their feet are oily, while working in paddy field doesn’t stuck up in the mud unlike the bulls of other breeds. We use trained bulls to teach ploughing to new bulls. We normally tie a trained bull along with an untrained bull while ploughing so that the untrained bull gets trained.