Fri, February 13, 2009
INTRO: An appeal has been made in Japan to save a baby "Valentine" bull born with a heart-shaped pattern on his forehead from the butcher's shop.
MOREINFO: The two-week-old calf, named "Ha-chan" after the word "heart," was born at a dairy farm 40 kilometres from Tokyo. The farmer noticed the clear, love-heart-shaped pattern on the forehead the morning after he was born. He's now a local celebrity but if no-one can give him a home he will have to be sold for meat.
SCRIPT:
He's just two weeks old but Ha-chan the bull is already a celebrity in Japan.
Hundreds of people have been flocking to see the almost perfect heart-shaped pattern on his forehead.
(SOUNDBITE) (Japanese) KAZUNORI YAMASAKI, DAIRY FARM OWNER, SAYING:
"We may have seen similar patterns on other bodies but it's unprecedented for an exact heart shape to appear on the forehead."
Kazunori Yamasaki owns the dairy farm where Ha-chan was born.
He hopes someone will buy him as a romantic gift for Valentine's Day.
Otherwise he says his days are numbered.
(SOUNDBITE) (Japanese) KAZUNORI YAMASAKI, DAIRY FARM OWNER, SAYING:
"This is a baby bull, a male calf, so we can't keep him at this farm. We hope some tourism farm or a zoo will volunteer to take care of him. That'd be the best way to make him happy."
Ha-chan - which means heart - won't have to go to the slaughter house quite yet.
Young bulls are normally sold for meat at the age of two
But if a new owner isn't found before then even cupid will find it hard to protect him.
Sonia Legg, Reuters.
