THIS year will see RBST putting its fundraising efforts behind a programme to ensure the future of some of our rarest breeds of cattle.

The 2019 campaign ‘Saving the Future Today: RBST Cattle Campaign’ is aimed at funding the collection and storage in the Gene Bank of cattle embryos from breeds such as Irish Moiled, Albion and Native Aberdeen Angus.

Explaining the focus on embryo collection, field officer Richard Broad said: “The underlying reason for creating the Gene Bank was to ensure that, given the worst-case scenario of total loss of a breed, we would have sufficient genetics in store to re-create that breed. Originally, the only way to do this was to collect semen. However, science has made enormous strides and it has become both financially and scientifically viable to collect and freeze embryos’.

In launching its 2019 appeal, RBST hopes to achieve collections from as many of the Watchlist breeds as possible, working with Breed Societies and breeders to identify suitable animals for collection. Typically, for a full Gene Bank collection we require eight embryos. Each full collection costs in the region of £3,200.

If you might be willing to work with RBST by loaning a cow for IVF or Embryo Transfer get in touch with your local field officer.

More information can be found at www.rbst.org.uk/cattlecampaign2019