The History of the Rescue and Recovery Registry
Ridge Shinn
NADA Board
To understand the NADA board of directors’ decision to first study and then implement the Recovery Registry, it is important to go back in time more than 30 years.
In 1977-8, while working at Old Sturbridge Village in Massachusetts, I played a role in creating both the American Milking Devon Association and the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy. Working with an intern, Kristina Bielenberg, we added Milking Devon to our livestock and were looking for more.
Kristina called State Department of Agricultures along the East Coast, but without much luck. We then hit on the idea of touring state fairs, since Ox Pulls are still a common event and Devon have always been valued as oxen. In that way, we found quite a few Devon, most apparently unrelated; about 10 bull lines and 50 cows.
Shortly thereafter we called a meeting of these folks in Turnbridge, Vermont and in 1978 formed the American Milking Devon Association. A committee was formed to determine which Devon could be admitted to the new registry. Most of us had a real prejudice against the “beef type” Devon and considered the dairy Devon to be the “real deal”. In spite of our filter, a number of “dual purpose” type Devon got in.
This success in saving a heritage breed led Kristina, me and three others to form what became known as the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy. This fledgling organization operated off kitchen tables for quite awhile (including my own) before we raised the money to hire permanent staff and do the first survey of rare breeds of livestock in this country.
Today’s Devon breeders should note that as recently as 2002, the Devon was listed in the ALBC Conservation Priority List as “Critical”…the most threatened of the five categories. And Devon certainly were rare. I recall going to a meeting of the American Devon Cattle Club in 2002 and there were just four people in attendance.
That was to change rapidly, however, when I hired Gearld Fry to work with the New England Livestock Alliance. He saw his first Devon at the first farm we visited and he fell in love. Subsequent trips around the Northeast turned up quite a few Devon cows. But we found no bulls that could measure up to our standards. That’s why I bought Gearld a plane ticket to New Zealand and Australia. We were searching for semen from the highest quality bulls we could find.
Using semen from New Zealand’s famed Rotokawa herd, we worked with Dr. Jerry and Jeremy Engh at Lakota Ranch, flushing some good American Devon cows. Gearld and I became active in the American Devon Association and hosted the ADCA meeting the next year in a hotel in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. We drew 20 people (a 500% increase in attendance). Devon was off and running.
But the relationship with ADCA was not smooth. Years later, someone contacted me with a bull for sale that was “Rotokawa-sired”. But they also sent a photo of the dam and I was stunned—she was one-quarter white. I looked into the registration and was told the cow was indeed registered by the ADCA and was one-forth Texas Longhorn.
I was appalled, based on my work with rare or heritage breeds, that a registry of pure bred cattle would ever register cross-breds and call them Devon. Our relationship with ADCA continued to be strained and finally, in 2005 Gearld and I left the association and called on David Schoumacher to help found the North American Devon Association.
Meanwhile, in our travels, we had come across quite a few Devon cattle. At one point, a family in Maine called to say their father---a man of 80 years---had a Devon herd and was ready to quit. A visit to the farm confirmed that the cows certainly looked like Devon; there had never been any other cattle on their pastures. But there were no papers.
The NADA board heard of a few situations like this, and after much deliberation decided these valuable sets of genes belonged in our registry, if they could meet a rigorous set of standards. Among the people we talked to, was the Rare Breeds Survival Trust in England. They discussed their protocol for a similar threatened population of livestock. They recommended we implement our program but limited to females, not males, until the line was proven over three generations.
That, and many of their procedures, formed the pattern we used in designing the NADA protocol and procedures. The Recovery Registry was designed and undertaken by experienced cattlemen who did not stand to profit from the program. Its sole purpose was to preserve valuable, historic Devon genetics. Transparency is paramount; DNA and full records are available on line.
A day will probably come when a DNA test will be developed with enough precision and reliability to tell us whether an animal is in fact a pure Devon. If that day comes, I daresay there will be many folks with registered Devon who will be in for a big surprise while NADA’s Recovery Registry animals will pass the test.
Index
Overview
Case Study: 12 Stones Farm
Case Study: Watson Farm
Case Study: 5M Farm
Protocol
Article: History of Rescue and Recovery Registry
Article: What’s Wrong with Devon
Photo Album: Recovery Registry Cows
Sample Recovery Registry animal certificate
List of Animals currently listed in the RR
