Yaks are mainly distributed in Qinghai, Tibet, northwest Sichuan, northwest Yunnan, Xinjiang and Gansu. The average weight of a bull is 370kg and that of a cow is 260kg. Bull height 1 10 ~ 130cm, cow height100 ~10cm. Hair is thick all over the body, especially on the abdomen, shoulders, head and neck and limbs. Hair length can reach 20~30 cm. Hair can be divided into two types: sideburns and fluff. Hair is brown or black. Bulls have horns, and occasionally they don't. The horn is thick, bent backward, with wide body, short limbs, white tail and broom shape. The trained yak is cold-resistant, hardy and coarse grains-resistant. It can live in plateau areas with thin air and strong hooves. It is suitable for climbing mountains and crossing mountains. It has become the main domestic animals in plateau areas of China, an important means of transportation and a "plateau car". In addition, milk is an important food used for lighting; Meat is edible; Wool can be used to make felt ropes. Therefore, yak is a unique animal species in this area and the focus of local animal husbandry economy. The local people can't live without yak, and the characteristics of yak are doomed to be inseparable from this area, and people and yak have formed an interdependent relationship.

China is a paradise for yaks, and it is also the country with the largest number of yaks, with yak140,000, accounting for 90% of the total number of yaks in the world. Great progress has been made in the introduction, breeding and hybridization of yak in China, which has attracted worldwide attention. Therefore, the first international symposium on yak research was held in Gansu Agricultural University on August 6-6, 1994. More than 80 scholars from 10 countries attended the conference.