A century of agricultural research at Hillsborough has helped shape livestock farming across Northern Ireland and beyond. Having spent much of his professional life at Hillsborough, former ARINI Director Fred Gordon reflects on 38 years of change
When Fred Gordon first walked through the gates of the Agricultural Research Institute of Northern Ireland (ARINI) at Hillsborough in 1964, he was a young postgraduate student starting a PhD. By the time he retired, 38 years later, he had not only led pioneering dairy and environmental research, but also served as Director, guiding the institute through one of its most transformative eras.
Early research at ARINI focused upon poultry and pigs and some beef systems. “Whenever I came here in 64… there was no dairy research done at this institute,” recalls Gordon, who soon after his PhD was appointed to a dairy research post.
The birth of modern dairy research
The farm kept about 60 Shorthorn dairy cows, but they were there primarily to generate income, not scientific data. Milk was bottled on site by two “dairy maids” and sold locally. Gordon’s task was to build a dairy research programme from scratch.
Over the following decades, he oversaw the transition from Shorthorn cows to British Friesians and, later, Holsteins, and introduced crossbreeding with Jerseys and Norwegian Red. What began as a small, practical herd became a platform for systematic research into grazing management, fertiliser use, silage conservation, and the feeding systems that underpin modern dairy farming in Northern Ireland.
Grazing management and grass utilisation were early priorities: how much grass could be grown, how best to manage it, and how to conserve it as silage. These themes remain central to the work carried out by AFBI today.
Science that changed farming practice
One of the pivotal shifts in Northern Irish dairying was the move from hay to silage, a transition driven in part by Hillsborough scientists such as his predecessor as Director, Professor Murdoch, whom Gordon calls the “silage guru”. The institute carried out extensive comparisons of silage versus barn‑dried hay, work which helped convince farmers of its advantages in an unpredictable climate.
Perhaps the most influential contributions from Hillsborough during Gordon’s time was the development of near infrared reflectance spectroscopy (NIR) for silage analysis. Before its introduction, feed quality was assessed using slow and relatively crude fibre-based methods.
The institute’s work involved analysing large numbers of silage samples and building the scientific models that underpin today’s rapid feed testing.
“Being able to rapidly analyse silage was a huge move forward. What once took a week in a laboratory can now be done in minutes, allowing farmers and nutritionists to make far more responsive feeding decisions,” he explains proudly.
Ahead of their time
From early on, the institute also recognised the environmental implications of intensification, especially around slurry and nutrient management.
Long before ammonia emissions and greenhouse gases became central to agricultural policy, scientists at Hillsborough were quietly laying the foundations for today’s environmental research.
Gordon highlights the work of Peter Frost, who began measuring ammonia losses from slurry over three decades ago, and early experiments on slurry acidification and application technologies such as trailing shoe systems.
Another breakthrough came through respiration chamber research, which measured how cattle produced methane and other gases in dairy cows, and later in beef cattle and sheep. These early systems, built on-site, provided foundational data that later transformed understanding of animal nutrition and greenhouse gas emissions.
At the time, the work was driven by practical questions of feed efficiency. Today, it sits at the centre of environmental sustainability debates.
“Much of what is now seen as cutting-edge climate science was, in fact, built on decades-old measurement systems designed for entirely different purposes,” adds Gordon.
A Legacy Rooted in People and Place
Despite all the change—shifts from poultry to beef to dairy, from production to emissions, from Shorthorns to Holsteins—Gordon’s fondest memories are of the people and the sense of community at Hillsborough. He remembers doing stints as farm manager, organising staff in the tea room, and working alongside scientists, technicians and farmworkers who felt more like extended family than colleagues.
Now in his eighties and still rearing dairy heifers under contract, he remains deeply engaged with farming.
A legacy of innovation—and a challenge for the future
If one theme runs through Gordon’s reflections, it is the importance of communication—both within science and with the wider farming community. In his era, Hillsborough’s open days were major events.
“On a dairy open day, you could have had over 2000 farmers here… busloads of people from Waterford and all over.”
As Hillsborough reaches its centenary, Gordon reflects with pride on how the research centre has delivered decades of impactful research, from animal nutrition to environmental science, and has played a key role in shaping agriculture across Northern Ireland and beyond.
Looking ahead he stresses that the challenge for the next century will be to ensure that “the connection between science and the farm gate remains as strong as it has been in the past.”