Starting with Cattle

When Henry first bought his property on the Herbert Hill, there was a lot of grass and it was a surprise to the locals that he decided to run some cattle. The reason for their surprise was that at the time the district was on the back of a severe five year drought and nobody was ready to believe that the drought was actually over.

Snow Wilkie had told Henry that super phosphate he applied on his hill country farm had not dissolved during those five years.

Henry knew droughts have always plagued North Otago because he had seen photos taken in 1916 that showed the farmland on the lower Kakanui Range was very hungry [dry] and farming was indeed a huge struggle.

The climate has perhaps changed because those prolonged severe droughts no longer seem to happen, which Henry reckons is because of increased precipitation due to the forest - some may argue about that, but he is always prepared to debate the issue.

Back in the day when Henry first arrived at the forest, he often mulled things over with Albert his clerk, who was always helpful because after all they shared a number of interests, one of which was cattle. Albert owned a house cow, called Polly, which he hand milked twice a day to help feed his four young children. He offered to rear a bobby calf for Henry because Polly was a such a good milker that there was plenty of surplus milk.

A bobby calf is a new-born calf from a dairy farm that is usually sold off for veal or otherwise disposed of because the farmer has no use for it. Henry bought a sturdy bull calf from Tubby Stewartson, a dairy farmer from Maheno.

The calf grew steadily on Polly's rich milk and Albert's good care.

It was time to wean the calf and take to Henry’s farm to be released in a grassy paddock. So Henry, with the exuberance (foolhardiness, if you like) of youth, told Albert that it was a simple matter of tying the calf's feet (hog tying) and lifting it into the back of Henry’s trusty Commer Cob stationwagon.

He didn’t notice Albert’s grin.  

Hand reared calves are quiet and this one was no different, but it did object to Henry’s rodeo style of trying dropping it onto the ground so he could tie its legs. It had a rope around its neck and when Henry attempted to tip it up, it took off down the hill with Henry holding as best he could, hoping to halt the calf’s progress!  But it was strong!

Henry lost his balance as the calf careened down the hill towing him through thistles, through cow pats and over stones! Determined and covered in a mixture of soil and cow dung, he held on eventually managing to regain his feet by pulling himself towards the calf [not the other way around] and then with a struggle, he managed to tip it on its back. Albert had the feet-tying rope and he was still up where Henry and the calf started, laughing his head off! The calf was puffing as much as Henry, and he had to hold on grimly until Albert had recovered enough to bring the rope down for Henry to make a very secure job of tying the calf’s legs - trussing it up so it could move only its head!

Albert took one side of the animal, Henry the other and on someone’s command they lifted!  But it was a dead weight, the calf wasn’t going anywhere! The animal was way too heavy, they couldn’t even clear it off the ground! Albert laughed and laughed again!

They were forced to let the calf go and Henry went off to borrow a stock trailer, as Albert had suggested in the first place!

At least that process went well and before long the calf was happily grazing in Henry’s paddock.