Got Drench?

You could feel their eyes staring at you. Nobody was brave enough to say anything to our face. They just watched us as we walked by, peeling off our work gloves. Then came the whispers, all around us. And you know they were talking about us.


“Who are they?”, a young boy whispered to another classmate as he stood almost stunned by our presence.

“I think they’re the Canadians.”, the other replied.

“Ohhhhh.”



Lanteglos ~ A new FHINZ experience.

We left Te Anau en route for the Waituna Lagoon to spend a week with the Hall family; Martin & Jane and their two daughters Catherine and Nicola. The week flew by and we leave later on today to start preparation for our two week trip to Stewart Island. It’s early Sunday morning, November 16th.

We had another wonderful FHINZ experience and are saddened to be leaving this wonderful farm. I could spend my life living on a sheep farm. I don’t think I can get enough of these half brained animals. As dumb as they can be, they are so wonderful at the same time. At one point I was in a pen full of sheep and became surrounded by the herd as they pushed around trying to avoid the race on one side and two of the dogs on the other side. They pushed me around quite a bit, but I just pet them on their heads as they bumped around.

Moments that I’ll remember on this farm.

The medley of sheep calling out to their young. At any point when you move sheep and lamb around from paddock to paddock or into a sheep shed, they all just run in one giant mob. This inevitably leads to mother-child separations. What you get in the end is a colossal symphony of the sheep. All the moms calling out to their lambs; shifting their heads around sharply as they try to listen for their young. The lambs trembling from being out of breath and slightly frightened by the separation from their mothers; calling out to find comfort. I was watching over the gate to a paddock yesterday and just couldn’t help but enjoy this moment as a hundred or so sheep and lambs fought over each other’s cries to locate their offspring. These white speckles shifting in endless green fields.

Oyster catchers running in the paddocks.

The bloody lamb that probably bashed his head into a fence while he was being shifted. He started marking the sheep with fresh blood as it trickled out from the corner of his mouth.

The stupid lambs that decide that the open gate is not a feasible exit point, so they start ramming into the fences and either barely squeezing through an opening or getting stuck altogether. I had one lamb that couldn’t comprehend that he had to walk around the gate to get into the other paddock with his mom. He was the only lamb that didn’t cross over into the other paddock, cause he kept cornering himself behind the gate that closed onto the fence. When I went to shoo him around the corner, he bashed into the fence and got his head and one leg stuck in one of the fence openings. I had to yank him out to free him, and he still didn’t go into the other paddock until the dog came around.

The four dogs that the Hall family has – Bess (the top dog), Jake, Meg and Kate. They herd sheep with their barking, which was different from the McLay’s dog that used its eyes. These dogs quite often would come alongside me to get some love when they weren’t working.

I found a sheep that was cast and helped it back up. They can kick pretty hard, but I’ll never know which bruise that one painted me with.

After moving a medium-sized herd of sheep into the sheep shed, we went inside for morning tea. When we returned to the paddocks, we shifted one more herd to the shed for drenching. After sorting out the sheep, we noticed that it was really quiet inside the shed. One look inside and you could see why. Our original herd disappeared. Apparently they pushed open a wooden gate and started to make their way down the road. Martin had to go down the road to retrieve the silly animals.

The drenching of the lambs. You line up the animals into the race (which Brent and I had recently cleaned out), and Martin walks through with his Ghostbusters-style pack to feed the lambs their share of the medicinal fluids (to keep them healthy and fight off bugs). Their mouths were lined with bright neon blue moustaches and dribbles. After being drenched, the lambs could be seen smacking their lips together as if they were enjoying the flavour and smiling just a little. When I asked Martin if he knew any farmer who had tasted the drenching fluids before to see if it tasted good, he let me know that he personally hadn’t tasted it before, but that it didn’t taste awful. He mixes the fluid with other things, and has found a formula that the lambs will at least swallow. Before, they used to spit it out.

Riding on the back of the four-wheeler. Competing for space with Bess. Enjoying the wind blowing in your face, and enduring the dust and grit. This farm is on a flatter part of the country, and is a very fast ride.

Moving two cows and their calves. One calf which was 4 days old and so awkward on his feet. His two front legs seemed shorter then his hind legs. A common trait for calves; slightly disproportionate at the beginning of life. But they really are adorable creatures. There are a lot of dairy farmers out here and you find a good amount of paddocks with just calves – who are taken off their mothers almost straight away.

Tailing and earmarking the lambs. Martin has this great trailer contraption that holds a portable pen that you bring out into the paddocks to corner off sheep in their environment (instead of shifting them into a shed). We round up the sheep into one corner and slowly close the gates in onto their group. From there, Martin separates the ewes (who are freed into the paddock) and the lambs (who enter a separate gated area). Needless to say, you get a lot of screaming mothers and children for a good amount of time. One by one, Brent would hoist a lamb onto this cradle contraption that would hold the lambs still while they were being tailed. Then I was supposed to ear mark them, which is basically clipping their ear (think of it as ear piercing – it’s not cruel) to identify them as boy or girl. When I couldn’t find the right spot and just felt horrible for even trying and possibly hurting a poor lamb, I was demoted to ‘earmark tool holder’ and I also managed the counter by clicking it every time we did a lamb. I think I was also promoted to ‘lamb calmer’ as I would pet the lambs who would start to buck around in the cradle. They buck out of frustration with the unfamiliar (again – they are not in any pain). Most of them would calm down the moment I laid my hand on them. How precious. I could stare into their sweet little faces all day long.

Spending part of an afternoon sprinkling weed killer in the family’s second land property, where they have 17 cows grazing in one paddock and 2 heifers in another. The cows were going nuts. At first, I think they thought we were there to shift them into a new paddock. They came right up to the fence and the gateway to the new paddock. A few of them started to huff and make loud sounds, almost donkey like, which may have been mating related, but we’re not sure. They were literally galloping towards us all at the same time. Even with several electrified wires in the fence, we weren’t convinced that they wouldn’t get through. We don’t trust cows after that one white one charged at us.

Working on fences. Digging a trench to bury a new electric wire, only to fill the trench back up again. Scooping lamb droppings and wool in the race. Loading fire wood. Pruning a rose bush. Tidying up around the house.

Living in a hut in the Hall’s backyard.

The beautiful garden Jane has created. She didn’t have a view – due to the flat nature of this part of the country – so she created a view with her garden. There is a different perspective and collection of plant life from every window in the house.

Our afternoon trip to Riverton with Jane. She is the principal of her school and was researching an upcoming field trip. A nice quiet town. A yummy cafe.

Deep South Ice Cream.

Home baked food. So delicious.

Spending two days helping out at Woodlands Full Primary School. We did a bit of grounds work tidying up around the place. I gotta tell you, when you spend hours sweeping outside a school, to then just have the kids spend their break running around the place and dumping their rubbish literally around the rubbish bin and kicking all the rocks and soot you just removed right back onto the pavement, it makes you want to cry. We were the ‘Canadians’ who most were afraid to even say hello to. If you said hi to a school kid, they might recoil and run in the opposite direction. Amusing. We spent the second day cleaning out their sports shed – which is my type of nerdiness. I love organizing; and this shed was in desperate need. The school was enjoyable; so small and intimate. The kids run around without shoes most of the time, a trend we have seen throughout New Zealand – kids walking around in bare feet, even in the heart of the bigger cities. We were mentioned in the school’s weekly newsletter and we even triggered a frantic phone call to the principal (Jane) from a concerned parent who thought we were detentionees from a prison/detention centre working on the school grounds. I guess one of the children told their parents an embellished story of our arrival at their school. Caused a bit of a stir, but you’ll always get at least one parent like that.

Building a Wasgij with the girls.

Sitting alone in the home on a few occasions where Martin was out of town and Jane was in town working late. Being trusted with their home, even though we are still strangers to them. I even drove Jane’s car home from her school on Friday, when the family had to head over to a farm they were looking at an hour and a half away. Trust.

The incredible moonlight that lights up the yard like a streetlight.

The paddock of sheep right outside our hut.

Just being back on a farm. I don’t think I could ever grow tired of being on these sheep farms.


A big thank you to the Hall family for their incredible hospitality and warm environment. We had an incredible time and will treasure our memories from your farm for years to come. We wish the family all the best as they will be moving away from their farm mid-December. We hope you find the perfect farm to call home, if not right away, then in the near future.


Good bye once again lambies. Thank you for all the smiles you bring to me. :)