Every spring, Lake Heron Station in Canterbury musters merino wethers off north facing slopes in the headwaters of the Rakaia River.
To borrow a musterer’s phrase, this is ‘decent country’ and traditionally the spring muster needs four musterers and takes four days (with one of those days lost to bad weather). The gang is based at a hut about 15 km from the homestead. They ride horses to the country to be mustered and then there is a lot of walking involved.
But with the ewes lambing, spring is always a busy time of the year. It is also often hard to get a gang together for more than a day or so. To save time, in 2006 the station owners Philip Todhunter and Anne Palmer broke from 150 years of tradition and decided to use a helicopter to help them complete the entire operation in one day.
Helicopters are no strangers to Lake Heron. A professional pilot, Philip flies skiers into the Upper Rakaia for heliskiing during three months in winter. But this was the first time a chopper had been used for mustering and it was very much an experiment to see how well it would work.
The chopper arrived soon after daybreak to transport 10 musterers and their dogs to the top of their beats. Within half an hour the four teams were in place and ready to start the day’s work. Along with saving time, from the air the musterers could check out the location of the sheep and the lay of the land.
By late morning the huntaways were barking up. Through binoculars, mobs of sheep could be seen scuttling down the faces kept on track by the heading dogs.
By mid day sheep from the various beats were mobbed up on the riverbed and the musterers stopped to compare notes. Yes, it had all gone well although one dog had gone AWOL and there was general agreement this is certainly country for young bones, even with the help of a helicopter.
The sheep have full fleeces so are driven quietly across a small swift river then up a hill and through a Taranaki gate. In a couple of weeks they’ll be mobbed up again and driven to the homestead to be shorn. By next June they’ll be back out here growing wool for the skiers’ SmartWool socks and Icebreaker clothing.
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