Critically endangered primates could soon be singing a romantic duet after being paired up to strengthen their species’ chances of survival.
Key points:
A breeding pair of white-cheeked gibbons have arrived on the Sunshine Coast from Perth
Carers hope Tao and Tian will mate and increase the gibbon population
Ahead of mating, the two will begin singing a loud and complicated love song
The two white-cheeked gibbons arrived on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast a little over a week ago from their former home at a West Australian zoo, and carers said they were settling in nicely.
Male gibbon Tao came over to his new home with female Tian as a breeding pair after two years of planning and preparation at Wildlife HQ zoo.
Animal collections officer Nikki Mikula said watching the gibbons run, play and laze about was an excellent way to spend time.
Female white-cheeked gibbon Tian has been moved from Perth to the Sunshine Coast.(Supplied: Sue Tonga/ Wildlife HQ)
“Tao is a very gentle soul — he’s very cute, and nothing like Tian,” she said.
“Tian seems very sassy and certainly gets the message across with what she wants and needs, and bosses him around.”
Tao has been described as a “gentle soul” after arriving at this new enclosure.(Supplied: Sue Tonga/ Wildlife HQ)
Ms Mikula said there were only a few hundred of the distinctive looking creatures left in the wild and the Sunshine Coast zoo was part of the Australasian gibbon breeding program.
Female gibbon Tian enjoys relaxing at her new home on the Sunshine Coast.(Supplied: Sue Tonga/ Wildlife HQ)
White-cheeked gibbons are thought to be extinct in their home forests in China and are now only found in parts of Vietnam and Laos.
Ms Mikula said she hoped the couple could make a difference.
“These two have been lined up to make a baby,” Ms Mikula said.
“So hopefully, once they’re settled in and showing all the right behaviours, we’ll see some action happening, and be able to report later in the year that maybe we’ll be expecting a baby.”
The breeding of gibbons is not a discreet process.
She said the first step was to ensure that both gibbons felt safe and healthy in their environment and were developing a strong bond with one another.
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But after that, the experts and carers will be listening out for their language of love—an increasingly complicated and noisy serenade that the pair sing as they prepare to mate.
“We’re still yet to hear them sing together — gibbons are pretty well known for their song that they sing once they are bonded,” Ms Miluka said.
“The female starts it off, and then the male continues and it’s a bit of a duet.
“So once they’re fully settled and bonded and know that this is their new home, I have no doubt that we’ll start hearing them across the zoo.”
In 2001, foot-and-mouth disease broke out among livestock in the United Kingdom.
More than 6 million sheep and cattle were slaughtered and their carcasses incinerated on farms before the disease was brought under control.
In the wake of the crisis, estimated to have cost approximately $14 billion, the UK bolstered its national livestock gene bank to bolster rare domestic breeds, including sheep, cattle and goats.
The bank — a type of high-tech Noah’s Ark — securely stores semen and embryos cryogenically frozen as insurance against disasters such as disease, flood, fire or climate change.
Countries such as the Netherlands, Germany and the United States all have national livestock gene banks — Australia does not.
With foot-and-mouth disease now present in Bali, a popular Australian tourist destination, many are asking the question, why not?
With quarantine officials and the livestock industry on high alert, prominent Tasmanian sheep breeder Brenton Heazlewood is one such voice.
“I think it’s very vital, [because] the vulnerability of the livestock industry in Australia, particularly at the moment with foot-and-mouth in Bali, is really a wake-up call,” Mr Heazlewood said.
“The lead has got to come from the federal government.”
Vials of bull semen cryogenically frozen at Genetics Australia.(Landline: Tim Lee)
The Noah’s Ark of Genes
The proposal is far from new. Worldwide gene banks became popular in the early 2000s with improvements in technology and techniques that made it easier to securely store genetic material.
Newly appointed federal Agriculture Minister Murray Watt is awaiting a report by the nation’s peak scientific body, the CSIRO, on how such a facility might operate.
Senator Watt’s predecessor, David Littleproud, promised to establish a national gene bank in 2020 and re-affirmed the Coalition’s promise during this year’s election campaign.
Katy Brown of the Rare Breeds Trust of Australia believes the new agriculture minister must follow through.
Katy Brown and a rare Caspian Horse originating from northern Iran.(Landline: Tim Lee)
She is a producer and custodian of a range of livestock breeds. Her small farm de Ella in central Victoria has a range of rarities, including Highland horses, stocky, sturdy animals that originate in the wilds of Scotland.
She has a single Caspian horse, a hardy, athletic breed whose ancestry stretches back some 3,000 years to northern Iran. The breed was rediscovered in the 1960s; Caspian horses shipped to the United States saved it from probable extinction.
Globally, there are many thousands of domestic species farmed for food or fiber — everything from cattle, sheep, horses, poultry, waterfowl, camels, donkeys, goats.
But it is estimated that several breeds become extinct every month.
gene extinction
Pigs are especially vulnerable because modern production favors intensive indoor piggeries.
Ms Brown also has ginger-coated, tufted-eared Tamworth pigs, now very rare for that very reason.
Australia is free from many diseases endemic to pigs elsewhere in the world. That means fresh pig genetics cannot be imported.
A Tamworth pig — one of a number of pig breeds now listed as rare in Australia.(Landline: Tim Lee)
“Back in the 60s, they were actually a premium bacon pig in Australia. And around the same time, Landraces and some of the white breeds came to Australia and also pigs went indoors,” said Ms Brown.
“These old breeds which had thrived and done really well — usually as part of a dairy farm — lost favor way back then.”
The Rare Breeds Trust says four pig breeds have become extinct in Australia in recent decades. It lists the Tamworth as critically endangered.
Ms Brown also has a few Wessex saddlebacks. They are only slightly better off.
Tamworths (left) and Wessex Saddleback (right) are rare pigs and would be protected in the gene bank.(Landline: Tim Lee)
“They’re in so low numbers now,” said Ms Brown as the pigs noisily foraged in a nearby paddock.
“The animals that I’ve got out there are rarer than zoo animals. You know it’s pretty serious.”
Establishing a national gene bank
The trust has advocated for a national gene bank for several decades. Now the wider livestock industry is joining the chorus.
In truth, many of Australia’s most valuable genetics, especially those of cattle and sheep, are securely stored in privately run facilities.
But the specter of a calamitous disease such as foot-and-mouth reaching our shores raises questions about our preparedness to preserve our priceless livestock genetics.
“It does get us thinking a little bit more acutely about what we should or could do to give ourselves a level of protection in the future,” Anthony Shelly, from Genetics Australia, said.
Anthony Shelly says there is a strong level of support from the industry to create a national gene bank in Australia.(Landline: Tim Lee)
The company, built on supplying elite genetics to Australia’s dairy industry, now exports material to more than 30 countries.
“We’re running just over 250 bulls on licensed semen collection. We are the largest semen collection facility in Australia, producing over 1.1 million units of semen annually,” Mr Shelly said.
He believes there is widespread support from livestock industries to build a national livestock gene ban and is willing to share his company’s expertise.
“We would welcome the opportunity to be involved in assisting in the stewardship of such a program because we do genuinely see it as being a really important investment in [the] continuation of Australian livestock production,” he said.
Watch this story on ABC TV’s Landline at 12:30pm on Sunday, or on ABC iview.
It may be a bumper season for many Queensland cattle breeders due to good rains, but one farm has seen an increase in twins as well.
Key points:
A south-east Queensland grazier finds two sets of twin calves within the space of a week
A leading veterinarian says the chance of beef cattle having multiple births is less than 1 per cent
Producing twin calves puts extra pressure on their mother to produce enough milk
Grazier Sue Harrison said she was shocked to find two of her breeders had given birth to twins over the past week on her Darlington property in the state’s south-east.
“I go around and check the cows because they are all calving at the moment,” she said.
“I saw this cow laying in the grass, which is quite long, and I saw one calf pop up to have a drink, and I looked and had to do a double take, because there was another one on the other side.
“It was a bit of a surprise.”
Three days later Ms Harrison was checking the stock again and saw another cow had given birth to twins.
The sixth generation grazier said they had previously only ever seen one set of twins.
“One of the calves was born backwards so we lost him,” Ms Harrison said.
Both twins were conceived naturally from Brangus mothers and Speckle Park bulls.
Veterinarian Ben Wood says it is very rare to see two sets of twin calves on the one farm.(Supplied: Sue Harrison)
A rare event
University of Queensland veterinarian Ben Wood said the chance of beef cattle having multiple births was less than 1 per cent.
“It’s in that half a per cent [range] for those beef cows, so if they’ve got 100 breeders, they’re going to get that one every two or three years,” he said.
“Two sets is an even rarer chance.
“I bet those cows are really doing quite well, so that will increase their chance of ovulating twice at the same time, so it increases their fertility.”
Dr Wood said it had been a “particularly good season” for Queensland graziers due to a lot of rain producing good grass.
But he said twin calves put a huge strain on their mother, who had to produce large quantities of milk.
“That cow, the following season, probably has less of a chance of getting in calf because raising twins takes a lot out,” he said.
Vet Ben Wood says twin calves put a lot of strain on their mother’s milk supply.(Supplied: Sue Harrison)
Sue Harrison said they were supplementing the two mothers’ diet with lucerne hay.
“Both calves were having a drink so we’ve just got to hope that each of them gets enough to drink,” she said.
“Being winter when there’s not much green feed for them, it’s a bit hard for them to make up the extra milk.”
fertility problems
Dr Wood said twin calves of a different sex could struggle to reproduce.
“If they are sharing that placenta and they are a different sex, then the sharing of those hormones, that testosterone … that has a big effect on that female calf,” he said.
“They’ll have smaller ovaries and their reproductive tract just won’t develop.
“The male calf will be a little bit less reproductively fit, but not to the same extent as the female.”
The veterinarian said dairy cows were more likely to give birth to twins.
“Typically a dairy cow will have more twins on average,” Dr Wood said.
“They’re in that 2 to 4 per cent range.”
Dr Wood said cows could have difficulty delivering twin calves naturally because their legs could become tangled during birthing.
