ABSTRACT
In the Central Asian continental regions the climate is hot to moderately warm in summer and always extremely cold in winter. A relatively homogeneous distribution of feed supply exists in predominantly short grass steppe. A low density of forage plants and a short period of vegetation are characteristic. Nomadic livestock keeping is optimally adapted to these limiting natural conditions. Not only does it represent a complete adaptation to the particular ecology of the regions, but is also the only possible economic form of using nature. Therefore nomadic livestock keeping is not only extremely dependent upon land and thereby sensitive to even the smallest ecological changes; it is also a consequence of specific natural ecological conditions. In this respect two questions arise: (a) To what extent has livestock keeping been influenced by ecological changes? and (b) How was its origin determined ecologically? Both questions have been little researched.
