A sheath like that is actually a sign of bad health in bulls.

@Background Pony #9070  
Well we certainly aren’t going to allow Felidae levels, that was way too much detail.

@Princess Luna
 
I remember two more cartoons, where they showed realistic anatomy. “The plague dogs 1982” and “Felidae 1994” Despite the adult rating, these films were sold by pirates as children’s cartoons in some countries.

@Frustration in Excelsis  
Sheaths were put in for the Spirit move in the 2000s, and balls & buttholes to this day are commonly seen on animals in anime, and occasionally in animesque shows too (Code Lyoko for example is one of the rare cases of a western show with both).  
Censorship does clearly play a role sometimes, like when Samurai Jack came to Adult Swim and was denied a dog butthole, but they were fine with Bob’s Burgers’ episode about the butt paintings, so I doubt that it’s a consistent thing (might be just that Samurai Jack didn’t have sway with the censors to get little things approved).
 
Overall, I think it’s mostly just a style thing. Modern western cartoons usually use styles that omit a lot of detail outside of the face to save time while retaining expressive characters. Adventure Time is a good example, as it has a style where characters’ bodies are usually just sort of blobs, but the one time it showed features like this, it was chicken cloacas as part of a gag about shooting eggs out of them.

I wonder precisely what led to this sort of thing going from acceptable in the 80s to something that would barely pass censorship now. Would it be changing attitudes to what is or isn’t safe material for children, the fact that editing post-factum is just a lot easier now and animators are more likely to go back and touch up controversial material after airing, or a mix of both?

I doubt parents would complain considering how short this scene is and how, whenever you look at a bull, you’re looking at his dangerous horns, not his private parts lol

@Phantom Rider  
It does have a split in the hair that isn’t quite visible with the poor quality of this upload, but it also reappears consistently when the bull is in motion, so it’s probably meant to be an actual feature, just in a family-friendly way.

OK, I see the episode information in the tags.

@GypsyStallion  
An actual screencap.

Question: is this actually a screen cap, or is this just original artwork that is designed to look like a screen cap?

woah there. That’s l-lewd.

You know it’s probably supposed to be a tuft of fur. But still….

WTF…

Bull sheath lol.**