THE CHAROLAIS INVASION THAT ALMOST FAILED…
THE CHAROLAIS INVASION THAT ALMOST FAILED…
Forty years ago, Charolais cattle first set foot in the UK.
Peter Grimshaw reveals that they nearly didnt make it
ANYONE unable to remember the times would scarcely credit how chauvinistic our livestock breeding industry was until the middle of the last century. Generations of farmers had been raised on the adage that Britain was the stock farm of the world. What did we need of motley foreign breeds?
These attitudes were reinforced by what were probably the most stringent animal quarantine regulations anywhere. Foreign animals were widely considered to harbour foot-and-mouth, blue tongue, rinderpest or worse exotic diseases.
Even when traditional brown-and-white dairy cattle retreated before an advancing horde of Friesians bred by AI, it never appears to have occurred to most beef breeders – still less, shepherds – that foreign traits (gene was not a word used outside the laboratory at that time) could possibly have anything to offer.
There were a few visionaries who recognised that what Friesians had done for the dairy industry and the Landrace for pigs could also be applied to ruminant meat production. But for the majority, to quote the Charolais pioneer and historian, Tony Harman: "It was unthinkable that, of all the countries of Europe, France could have a beef breed that was better than any of ours." Why, it wasnt so long since they had been using such animals to pull carts and ploughs.
However, a small group of farmers had heard of the Charolais. They were mostly milk producers who wanted a better crossing bull for dairy beef than the small, slow-growing Aberdeen-Angus or Herefords of the time.
After much pressure, the minister of agriculture John Hare agreed to an importation of bulls only, which were to remain under the control of the Milk Marketing Board and a handful of other AI providers. Female imports were ruled out, and the subsequent minister, Christopher Soames, stubbornly refused to allow a lone purebred heifer imported perfectly legally from Canada to be inseminated. This entrenched opposition condemned UK breeders to the long, slow process of grading up.
The first bulls were imported by the ministry in 1961. In spite of their interest and efforts as ambassadors of the breed, UK Charolais fans had not been allowed to see them and, with no females in the herdbook, they could not even register as a breed society.
The first cross-bred calves were born in January 1963 and received a poor press, but it was not long before butchers began to recognise their qualities. When Charolais cross animals started to take prizes at finished cattle classes, even the ministry began to take the breed seriously.
The Milk Marketing Board later bought Warren Farm at Lambourn as a progeny testing station for the offspring of this importation and for further introductions of Charolais and other breeds that soon followed.