Women and Dexters

There a special association between women and Dexters. What is this association, and why does it exist?

THE HISTORICAL LINK

Women have owned some of the most important Dexter herds, and they are prominent amongst Dexter breeders in all countries. In England, Lady Loder was a breeder of one of the founding herds, the famous Grinstead herd. Its beginnings were in 1908 when she purchased several heifers from another woman breeder, the Duchess of Devonshire. Lady Loder commenced showing in 1921 continuing right through until the late 1950s. There are a large number of important women Dexter breeders in the UK. In the first one hundred years of the UK Dexter Cattle Society, a woman held the position of President for 38 of those years. The two books published to date on a Dexter herd are on women breeders - Rosemary Brown's The Ilsington Herd of Dexter Cattle (published in 1997) and Beryl Rutherford's book on her Woodmagic herd, My Love Affair With the Dexter (published in 2005).

The history of Dexters in USA and Canada mention women breeders as important in the early herds and in importing live animals from the UK.  

In Australia, Mrs Jessie Maclellan imported Dexter-Kerry cattle in 1911. Bridie Prettejohn was the next Australian to import live Dexters from the UK. The group of nine breeders who first met to set up the Australasian Dexter Association included six women. The founding President, a male, records that three of the women "did much of the early work" of the Association. The first registered Dexters imported into South Africa in 1917 was by Mrs Conroy of Paarl in the Western Cape. Dexters first found their way to Zimbabwe in the early 1950s in a small herd belonging to a Mrs Visser.

THE SMALLHOLDING LINK

The link between women and Dexters may result from the place Dexters have found on smallholdings. Where a couple owns a smallholding, often the male partner may hold a full-time job off the farm. The female partner becomes responsible for much of the daily stock care and comes to take a leading role in decisions about what stock to carry and how to breed them.

In New Zealand, for example, in the Dexter Herd Book of March 2002, of the 239 memberships listed, 162 were in the name of a male/female couple, 42 in a man’s name, 64 in a woman’s name, 10 in the name of two females and one in the name of three females. Exclusively female memberships made up 31% of the memberships, with exclusively male memberships making up 18%.

THE NURTURING LINK

As a paper to the Second World Dexter Congress put it, "Dexters suit the nurturing aspect of women" and "require a different skill set than your regular farmer that favours women but does not exclude men" (Marion Popkin, Canada, “Winning Weighs for Women”).

Marion argued that Dexters can be farmed cheaper than other cattle as you don’t need a large amount of land and you can keep more to the acre. Due to their smallness, they are more easily handled by women, and their special character is attractive. However, Marion also noted "a free fitness membership by virtue of ownership" – smallness does not guarantee docility!

Marion gains income from her Dexters in a diversity of ways. One of them is by marketing to women who don’t own a farm – a Dexter cow is sold as an investment opportunity with further breeding stock and/or natural beef sold to provide the return. 

Of course, this special link between women and Dexters doesn't stop many men from breeding these delightful cattle nor does it stop Dexters from being a family cow and children's pet.

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