Desert island exile mooted for Hong Kong feral cattle

Many of the people who live in or visit verdant Lantau, Hong Kong's biggest island, love seeing its feral cattle roaming and foraging freely. Tourists pat and photograph the cows, which are used to cohabiting with humans. So it’s no surprise that a proposal to deport Mui Wo’s cows and water buffalo to remote Tai A Chau in the Soko Islands, which lacks fresh water to support even a human population, has outraged fans of the island’s bovines.

The Agriculture Fisheries and Conservation Department (AFCD) is considering evicting Mui Wo’s resident herd of 22 cattle and up to seven buffaloes, and their supporters have no doubt the town’s rural committee is behind the initiative.

The docile descendants of cows left to fend for themselves when the Trappist Monastery’s dairy operations were moved from Lantau in the 1980s, and wandering buffalo from abandoned farms, have met with increasing hostility in recent years. The Mui Wo Rural Committee has been pressing the government to get rid of them since 2012, says Ho Loy of the Lantau Buffalo Association (LBA).

“LBA is opposed to any kind of forced removal. It separates them from their traditional foraging trails and is psychologically stressful, especially for the older animals,” she says. “Two older cattle died within a week of being removed to Sai Kung in 2013. We believe forced relocation is a breach of their rights and a danger to their well-being.”

Emotions are running high on both sides. Some villagers regard the cattle as an obstruction to ambitious development plans for Lantau that would transform the sleepy rural island beyond recognition. In a 2013 survey, the department estimated there were 225 feral cows and 75 buffaloes spread across Lantau.

Jean Huang, a Pui O resident and staunch supporter of the wandering cattle, says she learned that the Mui Wo Rural Committee proposed the removal of both the Mui Wo and Pui O herds to Tai A Chau, also known as South Soko Island, which lies a few kilometres south of Lantau.

“Many village representatives agree. They don’t want cows and buffaloes stopping the development, and they have little farmland left. I suspect they have a big development company to support them,” she says.