Why passionate farmers are working hard to save heritage livestock breeds

Saving heritage breeds is a labour of love, according to adjunct research fellow at the School of Agriculture and Environment at The University of Western Australia (UWA), Catie Gressier.

"The reason I focused on love is because it's not talked about in agricultural spaces often," Dr Gressier said.

"And yet, anyone who's talked to a farmer knows that they are so passionate.

"We're all used to seeing these commodity prices and market figures, and we lose the human side in agricultural research sometimes.

"I was keen to emphasise what I think is a core motivation to farmers across the board."

In her new book, Saving Heritage Breeds: A Love Story, Dr Gressier tells the stories of Australian farmers who are working to preserve heritage breeds of cattle, sheep, pigs and poultry.

"There's a lot easier ways to make money than farming," she said.

"But for farmers, it's a vocation, it's a calling."

Interviewing farmers across the country who are raising rare livestock breeds, Dr Gressier aims to raise awareness of what we stand to lose if these breeds become extinct, and to encourage people to support these farmers.

"It might cost a couple more bucks to buy a breed that's brought up in a free range environment, not at a large-scale," she said.

"But we know that there's much greater biodiversity on small-scale farms, and that you're supporting families directly, not big corporations and their shareholders.

"If we can increase awareness of these issues and get people supporting small-scale farmers producing rare and heritage breeds, that would be an amazing outcome."

Dr Gressier said preserving heritage breeds was important for maintaining genetic diversity, and as a safeguard in the face of new diseases that different breeds have varying levels of susceptibility to.

However, she said they also play an important role in Australia's cultural heritage.

"I tell a lot of the stories of farmers who have had particular breeds in their families for generations, so there's that cultural heritage element," she said.

"Elliottdale sheep, which are one of my absolute favourites, and Drysdale sheep...these carpet wool breeds are just so awesome and it would be so sad to lose them.

"They're both down to a handful of flocks in Australia, and so the possibility of extinction is very real."

Her book stems from the three-year research project she commenced in 2020, alongside two PhD students, with funding from the Australian Research Council to investigate the conservation of rare breeds.

"I think it's an issue that is really quite worrying, and it's something that's just not being spoken about," Dr Gressier said.

"I was really quite shocked that it was such an under the radar issue."

There are an estimated 8800 livestock breeds across 38 farmed species, however, genetic diversity is at risk, with diminishing gene pools in commercial breeds and many heritage breeds facing extinction.

"We've lost one in 10 breeds globally," Dr Gressier said.

"There's at least 25 per cent more currently at risk.

"In cattle, we've lost 17pc of known breeds, so that's 184 different breeds of cattle already lost, along with 160 sheep breeds."

Dr Gressier is advocating to maintain the diversity of a wide variety of breeds as they all have something different to offer.

"Heritage types tend to be all-rounders, they're quite hardy," she said.

"They have good survival traits, they're good in outdoor systems, they don't need high feed inputs, they tend to have good fertility, good mothering ability, as well as unique traits across different breeds.

"They might have a different type of fibre that's suitable for different purposes, or adaptations to different environments, resistance to different kinds of pests, different flavour profiles and that kind of thing."

Genetic diversity is important in terms of food system resilience, particularly with the threat of diseases such as African swine fever, Avian flu and Japanese encephalitis.

"We know that diversity at the genetic, species and ecosystem level is really important in ensuring healthy populations and mitigating against risks," Dr Gressier said.

"Different breeds potentially have different resistance to these kinds of diseases, and this is an area where not enough research has yet been done.

"Also, the benefit of maintaining breed diversity is that we don't know what the consumers of the future will want and that enables us to have that breadth of possibility for all these different circumstances."

In chicken breeds, Dr Gressier said there was varying susceptibility to diseases such as Avian flu and Newcastle disease.

"There's an Egyptian breed called the Fayoumi, which research shows has more resistance to Newcastle's disease than the Leghorn breed, whose genetics are in most of our commercial chickens," she said.

"So maintaining breed diversity is an important safeguard for resilience in the food system."

Dr Gressier said with a changing climate, some breeds will fare better.

"Certain breeds have much better heat tolerance than others," she said.

"Holstein cattle, for example, are super productive but they don't do well with heat stress relative to other breeds.

"It's about hedging your bets and making sure we've got a breadth of resources for an uncertain future."

Of the 1.65 million dairy cows in Australia, almost 1.4m are Holstein cows.

"I was just in western Victoria last week and just driving through, you only see Angus cattle," Dr Gressier said.

"That's in the beef space.

"There's obviously Holsteins in the dairy space, but this loss of diversity is such an issue in Australia."

In the United States, 99pc of Holstein bulls that are produced by artificial insemination are descendants from just two sires that were born in the 1960s.

"There's a real focus on a few very hyper-productive bloodlines in some of these bigger breeds," Dr Gressier said.

"What's happened in turn, is that there's been the spread of certain genetic defects within that breed that has led to problems.

"So now, in the dairy industry, people are looking at heterosis, that hybrid vigour, in order to bring back some of the traits that have been jeopardised.

"There's a swing back towards all-rounders but because of that really singular focus on milk volume, some of the other traits in that breed have been compromised."

While agriculture used to be about food production, Dr Gressier said now it's about commodity markets.

"They're potentially not as profitable, some of these older breeds, because they're not as fast growing or as prolific in many instances," she said.

"It's interesting because now there are niche markets where people are really valuing, like Berkshire pork for example, people are really valuing the culinary possibilities and its deliciousness.

"Now you'll get more for a black pig than you would a white pig in some markets but on the whole, it's just all about the profit."

Despite the importance of heritage breeds in ensuring genetic diversity, government support and economic viability are key industry issues.

"In our work with the Rare Breeds Trust of Australia, a real focus at the moment is to try and set up a gene bank to protect semen and other genetic material of the most endangered breeds," Dr Gressier said.

"We've been trying to seek government support without much luck, so if the government would help with things like that and also take over the Food and Agriculture Organisation's census on breed populations, and to do the work in trying to understand what breeds are at risk, that would be an incredible shift."

For small-scale farmers, access to abattoirs and meat processing is one of the biggest issues they are facing, alongside small gene pools, challenges meeting regulatory requirements and climate impacts.

"We've seen horrendous floods, fires and droughts in recent years, which are exacerbated by climate change, and this impacts heritage breeds because whole populations can be wiped out," Dr Gressier said.

To support these farmers, Dr Gressier said consumers could see out rare breeds through talking to their butcher, as well as going to the Rare Breed Trust of Australia's website, who have a producer directory.