Bygone Days: Ulsterman tells of the excitement of sheep farming in New Zealand (1962)

We are told that the New Zealand farmer has the highest production per farm in the world. Certainly by home standards we run a lot of stock on our farms arranged so that the stock transport themselves to tucker rather than have tucker brought to them.

Glenshane farm is compact and stock movement is relatively easy but will improve in a year or two when I have put in a central race leading from the road to the farthest paddock, with gates leading off it to each paddock. At present I sometimes have to put a mob through a paddock which has other sheep in it and from time to time little accidents occur and the sheep have to be sorted up again.

Selling stock is one of our best managed operations. Last week I decided that it was time to quit some wethers with winter fast approaching so rang up the manager of my stock and station firm. He came up and we went over to my yards where we ran the 500 odd wethers through the race drafting them into a top and a bottom line. Drafting is done by driving the sheep through a narrow passage, the race, to a small gate swung across the passage which can be moved to block one or other of two exits. It is easy enough provided one does not get flustered as the sheep run past.

At the start of May 1981 the News Letter reported that Shane’s Castle had been one of Ulster’s main focal points over the holiday weekend. Pictured is a steam enthusiast of for the day was Mr Willy Montgomery from Ballymena, who brought along his 1930 Marshall engine. Picture: News Letter archives/Darryl Armitage

Once the sheep were in their two mobs they had to be counted by running them through a gate. I do not know who thought that counting sheep would help one to sleep but I am sure he never tried it. It is very difficult as they run through the gateways in blocks of three and four faster than the tongue can move. The trick is to count in threes which is easy at first, but by three times tables stopped at 36. Now at last I have found that the best way is to count each three sheep as a unit and I find it relatively easy. We tallied the top mob at 302 and rang up to arrange transport for the next morning.

The two trucks arrived on time. They are big double deckers, holding 140 lambs each, and they tow a trailer as well, able to carry another 40. They backed up to the loading ramp and in half an hour we were full up and drove off.

The saleyards have a couple of acres of pens and when I arrived my agents were redrafting the line into three qualities, a top line to attract the man working on a small but quick turnover and the other lines for those who come to the sale with a top price limit which they will not exceed. The pens are drawn by lot and here luck enters in. A pen that is lower than the selling alley is bad as the sheep look relatively small, it is bad to have a medium line beside someone else's tops as they suffer by comparison and so on. Each stock and station firm has its auctioneer and his helpers whose job is to take the bids. In due course my first pen came up.

“Now boys, we have these outstanding wethers from Glenshane, good shifters and well wooled. Who will give me 34/-? No? Right I will start them at 24/-, 25/- there, 26/- against you sir—27. Come on, now: these are the cheapest sheep sold today, 28 there” so on until we stuck at 35/6. Each pen has a time limit of one minute and the last few seconds are hectic.

At the start of May 1981 the News Letter reported that Shane’s Castle had been one of Ulster’s main focal points over the holiday weekend. Pictured are Sara Ross and Marie McCaughan from Randalstown stop to in the views during their visit. Picture: News Letter archives/Darryl Armitage

The second pen started at 26/-, well below its value. This was my chance. I have never dared look an auctioneer in the eye in case he thought I was bidding and now I was safe and gave a deep nod towards the pen, “ 27/-”.

And there it stuck as the seconds marched on. Visions of buying my own stock appalled me. I kept a stiff upper lip while praying hard till there came the blessed “28” which then struggled up to 30.

I average 32/8 over the 300 wethers which is good as it is all we get for a fat lamb and I had taken six shilling, worth of wool off them last January. The buyers were from down country where sheep fatten on the smell of a sea breeze. Their new owners will trickle them in, twenty or thirty at a time to the Christchurch market over the winter and could nearly double their outlay. Up here we have a 48 inches rainfall and always have feed so can hold sheep when there is a drought down country, but we find it very difficult to fatten so we go for the store market and do very well out of it, without m the trouble of putting in fattening feed.

The whole selling system is so streamlined that 30,000 head a day being sold at the annual ewe fairs. The costs are reasonable. I pay 10d a head for transport, 3d a head for yard fees and 3 per cent commission to my stock firm and all I have to do is to lift the phone and contact the agent. He will do the rest and I do not even have to go near the sale, but of course the excitement is greater even than the Route Hunt point to point on a fine sunny, windless Easter Monday.