May 2025
Patience and a willingness to focus on details are two key attributes of successful plant breeders, says James Kinsman.
He’s three years into his career as a plant breeder at Cropmark Seeds in Canterbury and says the need for both was obvious from the start.
His time with Cropmark Seeds followed two consecutive summers of employment with the company while he completed his Bachelor of Agricultural Science degree at Lincoln University, plus financial and mentoring support for his honours project through his fourth year of study.
In his honours project, he investigated the genetic diversity of endophytes, the fungi found in most ryegrass varieties which offer a variety of benefits to the plant.
His primary role at Cropmark Seeds is to apply plant breeding and selection techniques to deliver typically small but tangible gains to the company’s pool of potential ryegrass cultivars for the future.
Patience is needed because releasing a new commercial cultivar of any forage variety can take many years of selection and testing to ensure it offers advantages over existing, commercially available cultivars.
“Once you see your own material coming through, you sort of get attached to it in a way because it’s you who has crossed it, you’ve bred it, and so you’ve always got something to look forward to,” he says.
Seeing improvements through selection is rewarding, but Kinsman says he has learned to accept failures too.
“Sometimes it can go the other way too. Sometimes you think I’ll do this to make an improvement, but then, as with any sort of breeding, it doesn’t always work and then you can be disappointed. “
Being able to think critically is another key attribute which Kinsman says is needed for success in plant breeding.
“Sometimes when you’re looking at trials, you can get quite a lot of what you call noise that might be altering the results, so being able to think critically is helpful to interpret what is happening,” he says.
He is enjoying the variety of his role and the great balance of office and field work, plus the great support and mentorship from senior staff within Cropmark Seeds.
“My role is quite varied, it’s seasonal and also weather dependent too. I find it is a good balance between being outside in the field and also office work, analysing data, reviewing results and planning.”
Work load usually peaks around harvest time early in the year but is consistent through the rest of the year with regular monitoring and maintenance of trial plots, analysis of data collected and planning for the coming year ahead.
He has enjoyed being involved in a company that is committed to helping farmers achieve better, sustainable profits through adding new, improved forages to their systems.
He says a good example of Cropmark’s investment in the future of forage is the recent commercialisation of its own endophyte, CM 142, for the New Zealand ryegrass market. CM 142 offers protection to ryegrass cultivars from several common pasture pests, including Argentine stem weevil, porina, black beetle and root aphid.
“It’s an exciting development for Cropmark, quite a breakthrough for improving pasture performance, particularly around freedom from staggers as seen in other strains.
He appreciates the mentoring and support from senior staff within Cropmark, especially during his honours project and now, in his plant breeding work.
“Plant breeding is a bit of a niche area so if you’re studying at Lincoln or Massey, there’s not a lot of other students doing the same or similar work,” he says.
His advice to young people considering plant breeding as a career is to gain a good understanding of genetics and breeding, including new technologies like genomics. A good knowledge of agronomy and statistics is also vital.
“Another advantage for plant breeding is having a good understanding of farming and farming systems. You need to know the practicalities of how new cultivars are used in the real world,” he says.