serow

n.
Any of several goat antelopes of the genus Capricornis of mountainous regions of eastern Asia, having short horns and a dark coat.

[Origin unknown.]

Capricornis sumatraensis

TAXONOMY

Naemorhedus sumatraensis (Bechstein, 1799), Sumatra, Indonesia.

OTHER COMMON NAMES

French: Serow; German: Serau; Spanish: Sirao.

PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS

Head and body length 55–70 in (140–180 cm), height 33–37 in (85–94 cm), and weight 110–300 lb (50–140 kg). Upperparts are gray-black and undersides whitish. Horns are slim and slightly curved back, 6–10 in (15–25 cm).

DISTRIBUTION

Himalaya of India, Nepal, and Bhutan; western China; Southeast Asia (Myanmar, Laos, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia), and Indonesia (Sumatra).

HABITAT

Mountain forests.

BEHAVIOR

Usually solitary or in small groups up to seven. Crepuscular. Rest below rock overhangs and cliffs during the day. Known to swim between islands off the coast of Malaysia.

FEEDING ECOLOGY AND DIET

Feeds on a wide range of grasses, shoots, and leaves.

REPRODUCTIVE BIOLOGY

Polygamous. Mate in October–November, and gestation lasts about seven months.

CONSERVATION STATUS

Detailed distribution and local population estimates are unavailable. The population is considered to be declining due to illegal hunting and habitat loss, and it is listed as Vulnerable. C. s. rubidus and C. s. sumatraensis are Endangered.

SIGNIFICANCE TO HUMANS

Hunted for its meat and other body parts that have medicinal properties.

from Lepcha
This word originated in India and Bhutan

From the foothills of the Himalayas to a sanctuary in Japan, the serow has leaped into the English language. In the Himalayas this mountain goat innocently masqueraded as a yeti; on the island of Formosa it leaps twenty feet at a bound, and in Japan it's endangering another species.

In 1960, Everest summiteer Sir Edmund Hillary led a Himalayan expedition to look for the yeti, the larger-than-human "abominable snowman." His quest led him to a Tibetan monastery that displayed a rounded skin described as a "yeti scalp." But a Dutch zoologist, asked to examine the find, was reminded of something else: the serow. Comparing the skin with that of a specimen serow in Brussels, the zoologist concluded that the "scalp" was in fact a hat made of stretched serow skin. Its origin had probably been forgotten and then imagined to be the scalp of a yeti.

On Taiwan, the island formerly known as Formosa, nobody mistakes the serow for a yeti. The Formosan serow is a natural wonder in its own right, a goat that likes living in trees and easily jumps twenty feet from tree to tree. "No other animal anywhere can match their agility," says one authority. They are easy to track, however, because they make a point of marking their territory with their urine. They eat grass and plants, enjoying the leaves of cypress, fir, hemlock, and spruce.

As for the Japanese serow, not only is it an endangered species, so are baby trees in the serow's protected habitat. The Japanese version of this animal has been designated a national natural monument. In the Wakayama Experimental Forest of Hokkaido University, fences had to be put up around newly planted cypress trees to keep Japanese serow from damaging them. Cheesecloth over the fences hid the view so the serow would not try to break through.

Though the serow is found throughout eastern Asia, its name probably comes from the Lepcha language of the Sino-Tibetan language family, spoken by the Lepcha people of India and Bhutan. There are about 36,000 Lepchas in India, 24,000 in Bhutan. The name serow is attested in English as early as 1847 in the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. No other words of Lepcha are common to English.

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Goat antelope, genus Capricornis, in eastern Asia.

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