Tropical cattle: the Brahman

[Extract] Queensland is home to nearly half of Australia’s beef cattle, and the vast majority of those beasts contain at least some Brahman blood. As a result the Queensland cattle industry has come to depend on beasts whose origins lie outside Europe and which are better able to cope with the local environment. While today humped cattle are a common sight in Queensland, their adoption took place relatively recently and they were firmly rejected at first. The rise of the Brahman in tropical Queensland dates from the 1960s and occurred only after a concerted campaign on the part of government agricultural researchers. By 2001 that shift was estimated to have benefited the Queensland cattle industry by $8.1 billion