The Philippines: Past and Present (Volume 2 of 2)Worcester, Dean C. (Dean Conant)
History
The Philippines: Past and Present (Volume 2 of 2)
Worcester, Dean C. (Dean Conant)
Philippines; Philippines -- History -- 1898-1946
The wild carabao is a formidable antagonist, hard to stop and a
vicious fighter after he is once wounded. Under ordinary circumstances
he is very wary and difficult to approach. It is highly important
in hunting him to use bullets with great stopping power. A number
of men have been killed in the Philippines by wild carabaos which
they had severely wounded. The most recent case which has come to
my knowledge was that of a Mr. Barbour, in Mindoro. He was an old
hand at the game, and had killed fifty-odd specimens. He shot a bull
three times and it dropped apparently dead. Walking close up to it he
dropped the butt of his rifle to the ground between his legs, and held
the barrel with his knees while trying to light a cigarette. Without
the slightest warning the injured bull sprang to its feet and drove
a horn completely through him, killing him instantly.
There is an interesting and unsettled question as to whether the
wild carabaos of the Philippines are indigenous to the islands or
are merely the descendants of imported animals which have made their
escape from captivity. My own opinion is that both beliefs are true
or, in other words, that we have both a native wild race and other
carabaos just as wild and just as fierce which are the descendants of
tame individuals. The ordinary wild bulls have comparatively short and
thick horns, while the bulls of the species found in Nueva Ecija and
in northern Luzón generally have long, slender, very sharp, strongly
curved horns. I believe that the latter animals belong to the true
native race.
Wild carabaos are found not only at various points in Luzón,
but abundantly in Mindoro and the Calamianes Islands. They appear
in considerable numbers in Masbate, Negros and elsewhere in the
archipelago.
To the inexperienced hunters who are inclined to try to bring them
down my advice is "Don't!"
Few indeed are the men who have killed so much as a single specimen of
the tamarau of Mindoro. It is a small jungle-inhabiting ruminant. Its
color, when adult, is precisely that of the carabao. It is, however,
a much smaller and more active animal. The bulls lose no opportunity
to attack carabaos, both domesticated and wild, and in spite of their
own inferior size kill them with apparent ease.
The tamarau is extremely muscular and when it charges, which it is
prone to do on very slight provocation, bores a hole through the
jungle vegetation, coming on with the speed and recklessness of a
rhinoceros. Under such conditions it is excessively hard to stop,
and when it pushes its charge home, woe be to the unlucky hunter. With
rare exceptions it attacks when wounded if it so much as catches sight
of a human being. Even when unmolested it not infrequently charges,
without warning, when one gets unduly near. It feeds at night, and
never lolls around in the water as does the carabao.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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