Philippa Stevenson: Herd saved from oblivion

COMMENT

What ever happened to the rarest cattle breed in the world - the seaweed eating Enderby Island cattle?

Cast your mind back six years to May 1998, when after two years of trying to save the breed from oblivion, AgResearch scientists at Hamilton's Ruakura Research Centre announced the birth of an Enderby Island bull calf. He was named Derby.

His arrival brought the number of the endangered black and white breed to two. For five years a middle-aged cow, Lady, had been the sole survivor of the animals put on Enderby Island in 1894.

When the Conservation Department decided to slaughter the cattle on the outcrop 750km south of New Zealand in 1993, only a last-minute rescue attempt by the Rare Breeds Society's Michael Willis prevented total annihilation.

Genetically, the breed is of interest worldwide because of its ability to survive harsh, sub-zero conditions.

Derby was a high-tech accomplishment. He was born on May 15 by caesarean section from a surrogate mother implanted with an embryo that had resulted from the fusion of an egg from Lady and frozen sperm rescued from slaughtered bulls.

It was a big moment for science but, despite the excitement, only a tentative step toward conservation of such a fragile breed. It potentially added a source of good-quality semen to the low-grade frozen stash, but further births were still dependent on the aging Lady and her poor-quality eggs.

Three months later that changed. The science went up a notch to produce Elsie, a clone of Lady.

Elsie was many things besides the third member of the Enderby Island clan and a female with breeding potential. She was the cattle world's equivalent of Dolly the cloned sheep.

Elsie was the world's first cattle clone produced from an adult cell and the first to be alive at the same time as her genetically identical adult self.

Dave Matheson, a vet who headed the Enderby project for the Rare Breeds Society, hoped the breakthrough could be used to save other rare breeds.

But in the six years since Elsie's birth, Enderby Island cattle remain the only endangered species to have been brought back from the brink by cloning.

Today, they are a tiny herd of seven. Living in Canterbury and cared for by Matheson and his wife Judy, they consist of Lady, who is possibly 16 or 18 years old, Derby, three Lady clones and two heifer calves born in 2002 to two of the clones. Elsie died before they returned to Canterbury.

Willis, now a director of Rare Breeds International, said the calves born naturally to the clones were also quite a global first.

Lady, the group's matriarch, is "fat and happy". Derby, on the other hand, is an aggressive, territorial "nasty sod" with no fear of humans. Last week he destroyed Matheson's four-wheel bike.

The breed retains its feral nature. Their survival remains precarious and would be helped by the birth of another bull. Lady, whose reproductive ability was never good, is very old. One clone has never produced a calf and last year the other clones both had stillborns.

Matheson has yet to pregnancy test the cows this year.

Willis says cloning was the only way to save the breed but it is not a panacea for conservation.

He would give his top award to Lady. Like Old Blue, who saved black robins from extinction, Lady deserves to be on a postage stamp. The groundbreaking effort to save the breed continued to attract more excitement and admiration overseas than it did here, he said.

Ruakura continued to make cloning breakthroughs in 1998. In December, 10 friesian calves were born, the largest set of identical animals cloned from a single adult in the world.

Then the researchers settled down to improving their methods and success rate. Elsie might have been born, but 21 other embryos implanted in surrogate mothers at the same time did not survive.

Now a business arm of AgResearch, Celentis, has a quarter share of Clone International, which clones sheep, cattle and horses. The other partners are the US Geron Corporation and Australian interests.

Dave McCall, Celentis general manager for new ventures, said Ruakura's focus was on cloning and marketing high-value bulls, although it had produced lambs for research. Top friesian bulls Pierre and Ecstasy have been cloned.

China has expressed interest in the clones, which could sell for around $US200,000 each.

There is a voluntary moratorium on selling cloned animals in Australia and New Zealand, and the global market is only likely to take off if the US Food and Drug Administration rules that cloned animals are safe to eat.

A reader's query prompted this column. If you've ever wondered what happened to someone or some event in past news let me know and I'll investigate.

* Email Philippa Stevenson