The Chatham High School cattle stud, Bulang Park, houses the only known animals in Australia of a rare French breed of cattle - Tarentaise.
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The breed is dual purpose, meaning they can be used for both dairy and meat production. The 13 beasts at Bulang Park are more oriented towards beef, says Yan Kleynhans, agriculture teacher at the school.
The cattle were obtained from the the owner who originally brought embryos to Australia in 1987. Due to personal circumstances, the original owner had to give up the herd.
During the decades, a pure line of the breed has been maintained, and the Bulang Park stud is keen to continue that.
"Unfortunately, during the drought, the last bull in the country passed away," Yan said.
He has already ordered straws of semen from France for artificial insemination.
As one of the directors of the Rare Breeds Trust of Australia, Yan is passionate about saving rare domesticated breeds of animals from extinction, and the Tarentaise are not the only rare cattle Bulang Park breeds. British whites and Drakensberger, a South African tropical breed, also number in the stud's herd.
Drakensberger were the first cattle brought to Australia - the original shorthorns brought over on the First Fleet from Britain died before reaching South Africa on the voyage to Australia, and were replaced by the native South African breed.
Now, there are only around 120 on the national herd book.
British whites are a rare heritage breed from Britain, as the name suggests, and there are around 750 in Australia.
A pair of yearly heifer British whites, owned by a student of Yan Kleynhan's who started her own British White stud, took out won Champion Pair of Interbreed Females at the 2022 Wingham Show. The breed is also being featured at Wingham Beef Week in May, with steers donated by British White of Australia members having been sent to each of the eleven schools participating to prepare for the hoof and hook competition.
The Chatham High School show team show not just the commercial cattle from the school, but animals from the Bulang Park stud as well.
At Wingham Show they won Champion Senior Tropical Female and Champion Junior Tropical Bull with two of their Drakensbergers.
The team has recently returned from the Sydney Royal Easter Show, where they walked away with a Highly Commended ribbon for a cow and calf.
"It was a really good show. I'm very happy," he said.
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