AnimalsThe water buffalo is a large, dark animal with wide curved horns. It loves to wallow in water and mud to keep cool. Domestic buffaloes give much of India's milk and are used to plough rice fields across Asia.
Quick facts
- Scientific name
- Bubalus bubalis
- Group
- Mammals
- Diet
- Herbivore (eats plants)
- Lives in
- Asia, and farms elsewhere
- Habitat
- Wetlands, rivers and farms
- A young one is called
- calf
- A group is called
- herd
- Conservation status
- No category in our data
How it is classified
Scientists sort living things into groups within groups. Reading down, each step is a smaller group, ending with the species itself.
- Kingdom Animalia
- Phylum Chordata
- Class Mammalia
- Order Artiodactyla
- Family Bovidae
- Genus Bubalus
- Species Bubalus bubalis
Other members of the family Bovidae on this site: blackbuck, cow, gaur, goat, nilgai, sheep, yak.
More distant relatives in the order Artiodactyla: Bactrian camel, chital, dromedary camel, giraffe, hippopotamus, moose, pig, reindeer, sambar, wild boar.
Classification follows the GBIF Backbone Taxonomy. Other reference works arrange some groups differently. How classification works.
Is it in danger?
No Red List category for the water buffalo was found in our data source. What the categories mean.