Breed
Origin
Middle English breden, from Old English brēdan; akin to Old English brōd brood
Definitions
- 1: to keep and take care of animals or plants in order to produce more animals or plants of a particular kind
- 2: to produce young animals, birds, etc. : to produce offspring by sexual reproduction
- 3: to take care of and teach (a child who is growing up)
Description
A breed is a specific group of domestic animals or plants having homogeneous appearance, homogeneous behavior, and other characteristics that distinguish it from other animals or plants of the same species and that were arrived at through selective breeding. Despite the centrality of the idea of "breeds" to animal husbandry, no scientifically accepted definition of the term exists. A breed is therefore not an objective or biologically verifiable classification but is instead a term of art amongst groups of breeders who share a consensus around what qualities make some members of a given species members of a nameable subset. The term is distinguished from landrace, which refers to a naturally occurring regional variety of domestic (and sometimes feral) animal through uncontrolled breeding.
When bred together, animals of the same breed pass on these predictable traits to their offspring, and this ability—known as "breeding true"—is a requirement for a breed. Plant breeds are more commonly known as cultivars. The offspring produced as a result of breeding animals of one breed with other animals of another breed are known as crossbreeds or mixed breeds. Crosses between animal or plant variants above the level of breed/cultivar (species, subspecies, botanical variety, even different genera) are referred to as hybrids.[1]
