Generally regarded as a nocturnal resident of moorland lochs, it is usually more amiable than its equine counterpart the water horse, but has similar amphibious and shapeshifting abilities.
[1] The Celtic term for a bull is fairly consistently rendered as tarbh in Scottish Gaelic; tarroo is the Manx variation and tarw is the Welsh equivalent.
Sir Walter Scott also refers to a water cow in a story about an attempt to drain Loch na Beiste to kill one believed to be living there.
[15] Folklorist John F. Campbell noted a story told on Islay, one of the Inner Hebridean islands, which demonstrates the usefulness of having a water bull.
Just after a calf was born to an ordinary cow, an elderly lady, later identified as a witch, advised the herdsman to keep it separate from the other cattle, presumably after she noticed its deformed ears and suspected it was a water bull.
He struck up a conversation with her and shortly afterwards the pair sat on the grass with his head resting in her lap, but as he fell asleep she discovered seaweed entwined in his hair, a sign that he was a water horse.
[19] Conversely, stories published in 1937 by the clergyman George Sutherland suggest these hybrids are considered to be of superior quality to normal pedigree cattle in the far north of Scotland.
The animal was viewed positively by the Celts as an image of fertility and abundance; one tribe, the Taurini, even adopted the bull's name.