Lincoln University Associate Professor Dr Racheal Bryant was the recipient of the McMeekan Award at the 2024 NZSAP conference held in Oamaru.
Nomination for Rachael Bryant
Dr Racheal Bryant is a ruminant nutritionist and pasture agronomist who uses these skills, in farm systems research, to reduce the environmental impact of dairying. Over recent years, her research focus has been on reducing nitrate leaching through development and evaluation of nutritional management strategies in grazing dairy cattle to reduce urinary nitrogen output and urinary deposition. However, Racheal has also taken science leadership roles in several other research areas including grazing behaviour, cow-calf contact and milking management.
After growing up In Taranaki, Racheal earned a Bachelor of Applied Science (1st Class Honours) from Massey University in 1997 and then went on to complete a Ph.D in 2002, at Lincoln University. This work involved development of measurement techniques for use in a nutritive index for ryegrass breeding, supervised by Alastair Nicol and Frances Wilson. After a spell overseas, Racheal returned to Lincoln in 2007 as a Post-Doctoral Fellow with Grant Edwards and has since grown her career to her present position of Associate Professor.
The current dairy industry movement towards alternative forages, such as plantain, is the direct outcome of a continuum of government-funded research projects over the last 5 years where Racheal has had leadership roles, including Dairy Systems for Environmental Protection, Pastoral21 (P21), Forages for Reduced Nitrate Leaching (FRNL), and Low N Systems. Racheal was directly involved with development of methods to measure and reduce the nitrogen surplus on dairy farms. This work covered thorough evaluation of Italian ryegrass, diverse pastures and plantain as alternative feeds for grazing dairy cattle, all of which may result in significant reductions in urinary nitrogen. She has also led the development of one of three types of urine sensor currently available in New Zealand, which is being used to quantify the effects of nitrogen mitigation strategies on urine excretion behaviour of grazing dairy cows.
Racheal initiated (2018) and leads the Dairy Futures: Living Laboratory at LU, a teaching and research initiative designed to explore future dairy farming options which meet the environmental, social and economic challenges facing today’s and tomorrow’s farmers, the Living Lab continues to push the boundaries in academic and applied research. Through this initiative and her involvement/leadership across other large research projects, Racheal contributes to capability development for NZ agricultural sector. Nine Ph.D. and two Masters’ students have received the benefit of Racheal’s supervision across multiple projects, contributing to the production of 75 scientific papers in the last 5 years, including 12 presented to this Society and 12 presented at other conferences. Numerous honours students have also been supervised by Racheal through initiatives in the Dairy Futures Living Laboratory, a platform designed to bring students, industry and science closer together and to test new research in a systems context, meeting a critical need for livestock systems training.
With the development of the Lincoln University PEETER urine sensor and agronomic studies into pastures containing herbs, Racheal’s research group has been central to the understanding of how high moisture herbs such as chicory and plantain influence urination behaviour, urine patch dynamics and reductions to urinary nitrogen load to soils to reduce the risk of nitrate leaching. The impact of this research has provided the foundation for assumptions in modelling urine nitrogen distribution in tools such as APSIM and OVERSEER.
Racheal was also an early adopter of animal sensor wearables, successfully applying for a Catalyst grant to test a range of commercial sensors including CowManager Sensor tags, AfiAct pedometers and Polar Equine heart rate monitors to support teaching and research into effects of dairy nutrition management on behaviour.
Recognition of Racheal’s skills is evident in the demand for her services. Racheal has recently become Chair of the Strategic Demonstration Group for the South Island Dairy Demonstration Centre, an important role in maximising the impact from LUDF, including collaborating with industry partners, farmers and supervision of extension staff. She represents Lincoln University on the Ministry for Primary Industries technical advisory group for regenerative agriculture and has had associate-editor roles for NZ Journal of Agricultural Research, and Grass and Forage Science. As a long-standing member of the Australasian Dairy Science Symposium organizing committee, Racheal has recently taken the role as chair for the 2024 conference and and was President of this Society in 2018, following several years as a committee member.
Racheal Bryant has made an outstanding contribution to animal science in NZ in the last 5 years and is a very worthy recipient of the McMeekan Memorial award.
Nominees: Steve Davis, Alastair Nicol, Claire Phyn and Robyn Dynes