Photo/Illutration Stripes created with bleach offer protection to Japanese Black cattle from blood-feeding insects, according to a three-year experiment in Yamagata Prefecture. (Provided by the Okitama branch of the Yamagata prefectural government)

YAMAGATA--White stripes not only give grazing black-haired beef cattle a fashionable “zebra look,” but they also keep away biting insects, significantly reducing their stress levels and potentially enhancing their reproductive power.

Beef cattle that graze in fields bring several benefits for farmers. Their grass consumption reduces the costs for feed and labor, and the animals make use of sprawling idle farmland.

However, cattle outdoors are vulnerable to blood-feeding insects, including gadflies and cattle flies.

Growing stress from the pain and itchiness caused by the biting bugs can decrease the animals’ reproductive power. Moreover, they may become sick from bites by disease-carrying insects.

A report released a few years ago in Aichi Prefecture showed the positive effect of stripes on black-colored cattle keeping flies at bay.

A Yamagata prefectural government research team conducted July-September experiments from 2021 to 2023 to confirm that the stripes also worked with the same breed, called Japanese Black, in Yamagata Prefecture.

With bleach used in hair salons or white spray, the researchers created stripes 3-4 centimeters wide on the cattle’s coats.

The stripes had an immediate effect.

“Many farmers have hesitated to release their cattle on farmland because they feel sorry for the animals being targeted by gadflies,” said an official with the agriculture promotion section of the Yamagata prefectural government’s Tamaoki branch. “But we can now expect cattle to relax, rest and grow healthy if we give them stripes.”

The researchers, with cooperation from cattle farmers in Oguni in the prefecture, monitored the frequency of cattle wagging their tails, shaking their heads and raising their hooves--movements suggesting they are trying to turn away insects.

The cattle without stripes made those movements 16 times per minute. But the count dropped by 70 percent to five times per minute for the same breed with artificial stripes.

The bleach created yellow-tinted white stripes that lasted for about a month and a half. The white spray stripes lasted for a week or so.

Either way, the striped cattle seemed well protected from gadflies and cattle flies, according to the researchers.

The outcome of the experiment and reactions from farmers were published in agricultural leaflets.

“I was initially skeptical but stunned to see with my own eyes that stripes on cattle could keep away insects,” one farmer said. “It was plain to see they wagged their tails less frequently than their ordinary peers.”

The farmer also said that contrary to his concerns, he saw no incidence of cattle resembling zebras being ostracized by conventional-looking cattle.

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