WORDS BY ANNETTE SCOTT, IMAGES BY ANNETTE˛ SCOTT & PROVIDED.
Colin and Erin farm Erewhon Station, a 14,000-hectare high country property at the head of the Rangitata Gorge. Colin took up the Crown pastoral lease of Erewhon in 1998.
The station runs Merino sheep carrying 1,800 ewes and 1,800 wethers while wintering 1,200 hoggets. The Merinos share the harsh Erewhon environment with a Hereford herd of 100 cows plus replacements.
Key to all the farm operation is the Clydesdale horse stud wintering up to 70 horses and in a normal season producing about 20 foals on the ground by December.
It is hard country, with a ratio of one sheep to 2.5ha. Regular sheep can’t handle the harsh landscape, but the Merinos have learned to hack the highlands by developing a coat of exceptionally fine wool that is highly sought after by companies such as Icebreaker.
Shearing takes place in early October with all the ewes’ blade-shorn providing more protection for the ewe and leaving more wool on meaning they don’t require as much feed as if they were machine-shorn.
The cheque from the wool clip these days barely covers costs so horse breeding supplements the farm’s income with the “gentle giants,” the Clydesdales, also enabling an agritourism income offering tourists a back country experience with wagon rides and demonstrations.
It’s been during the “Drummond era” that Erewhon has become the home of the working horse, using horsepower as much as possible for all the farm work.
“It’s a lot of hard work but a lot of satisfaction. The ultimate for us is proving our breeding programmes, for ourselves. We are breeding for work ethic, longevity and soundness. They have the sweetest, most obliging natures, they give anything a go,” says Erin.
At the head of the Rangitata Gorge where the flood-prone Clyde, Havelock and Lawrence Rivers criss-cross Erewhon, Colin says “the horses are gold for getting access right across the country.”
“They move well. No mares go into breeding until they have done some work here and we learn their nature, they earn their way and that flows through the bloodlines.”
“There’s intelligence in the foals out on the hills, they are like big fat sponges, they cope well and that carries through in everything we do with them,” says Erin.
Colin began breeding half draught horses over 40 years ago and has had his own Clydesdale stud for 30 years, steadily expanding the breeding operation to supply the station with horses.
He bred registered Clydesdales as well as crossing a light stallion over registered Clydesdale mares to produce big-bodied half draught mares with fine, clean bone and a deep barrel for their broodmare line.
Erewhon Station currently runs a herd of 20 broodmares as part of its elite station-bred breeding programme.
Over the years Colin has placed huge emphasis on his mares, building up a strong broodmare band carrying some of the country’s top Clydesdale bloodlines.
One of the biggest advantages of breeding horses on a working high-country station is that every mare they use to breed from has been broken in and ridden, and often used for ploughing and in the wagon team.
They know which ones are good and if the progeny’s conformation or nature doesn’t measure up, they are not persevered with.
The stallions are put out with the mares in November each year with the purebreds and maidens all hand-served and scanned 18 days post serve for pregnancy to ensure no twinning, something the Clydesdale can be quite prone to.
Young horses staying at Erewhon have been well handled. As weanlings they are taught to lead and tie up and have their feet handled and trimmed.
The young horses are run together over sown hill country blocks for most of the year. They get experience crossing rivers and climbing steep terrain. Having run on the hills the young horses are good on their feet and have strong hindquarters.
Colin has always had a strong focus on breeding good free moving horses with the ability to work. “Horses are vital at Erewhon and are used for all aspects of station work.”
On top of the tourism venture, the Erewhon Clydesdale Stud offers surplus horses for sale annually in autumn.
So, the bottom line, farm versus horses? The accountant says its “fiscally neutral.”
“The horse breeding operation breaks even, tourism is on top of that, plus the selling is another string to our bow.”
The use of horses is one of the idiosyncrasies of the Erewhon farming operation. Most of the tractor work is done with a team of Clydesdales, and all the stock work is carried out on foot or on horseback.
“We use horses because they are predominately quicker to ride most places, and it doesn’t matter what the river is doing, we can still get back,” says Colin.
The Clydesdale team started off as a hobby but has turned into a cost-efficient way of getting the crops in the ground and getting around the station safely.
Colin was raised on a dairy farm, but inspired by books written by Peter Newton and Barry Crump, he chose a career farming Merinos in the high country.
As a young lad Colin’s love for the Clydesdale deepened as he watched them at local shows. “I never thought I would be able to afford one though.”
But in time, having worked around stations across the country, luck came his way, and he landed himself his ultimate dream when he took up the Crown Pastoral lease of Erewhon in 1998 and began setting up the farm to support the lifestyle he always craved.
He shares his love of this lifestyle with Erin, the couple meeting through their mutual love of horses and the high country.
Erin grew up in Fairlie, “a horse mad kid,” but her pleadings for a pony fell on deaf ears. She became friendly with a nearby “horsey family” who helped fulfil her horsey dreams.
On leaving Mackenzie College she could easily have followed her heart into farming, but it was an unconventional career for a young woman at the time, so she steered for a more academic career which took her through a variety of employment opportunities while excelling in sport, playing netball in the Canterbury Flames Squad and eventually training as a teacher.
Amid all of this she did manage to buy a Clydesdale-cross horse; Barrister was his name, and he stood very tall at 18 hands high.
“Boy was he a troubled child and I knew that, but it was all I could afford.”
Sadly, once Erin did get Barrister’s issues sorted and working well, he developed lameness with a hip condition and had to be put down.
“I grew up riding whatever horses, so I wasn’t scared of naughty horses, and it drew me into the world of natural horsemanship, which is practiced at Erewhon.”
Erin met Colin through the Clydesdale world and her trips to Erewhon became regular as they shared their passion for horses and similar philosophy on horsemanship, and their love of the rugged high country.
She moved permanently to the station in 2011 and while now married to Colin, continues to go by the name Cassie “most of the time.”
“It’s convenient sometimes (to be Drummond) but it was a lot less hassle not to change.”
The naysayers’ fears that Erewhon would be too isolated for Erin have proved unfounded as she thrives in a life with a rich mix of working the land, hosting friends and the tourists who arrive daily, and of course her deep passion for the Clydesdales, the lifeblood of the station.
For this farming couple, the opportunity to own and operate a high-country station, with the horses, is “a dream come true.”
Colin says they try to use the horses as much as possible for the everyday farm work.
“They don’t need diesel, but they do need to be talked to and fed with high energy oats which they help harvest,” says Erin.
“We generally work ground with an eight-horse team hitched four abreast,” says Colin.
Experienced horses make up the front four and give lessons to the youngsters in the second row.
They plough, cultivate, disc, harrow and roll.
“Equipment hasn’t changed shape much since the old days so therefore Clydesdales can do just as good a job as the latest tractors.
“While a tractor and modern machinery could often do a job quicker, we just make the time,” says Colin.
However, there are two qualities that give horses an edge; “the more you use horses the better they get, unlike machinery where the more you use them the more they cost you!”
When time and weather permit for harvest the mower is used in two horse teams to cut hay. The binders are used with four horse teams to cut and bind oats. The oat sheaves are then stooked to dry before going through the chaff cutter to make feed for the horses.
“The horses are making their own feed, and they go through a fair bit so we wouldn’t want to be buying it all in.”
The autumn and spring musters are Colin’s favourite time. The Clydesdales pull the wagon with dogs, musterers and supplies up the valley floors from where the hills are mustered on foot.
The horses are also used as hacks for riding out from camp to the base of the mountains each morning.
Colin says when it comes to getting home from the muster, a Clydesdale wagon team is usually more than a match for the three angry rivers that can rise in a flash.
Horses are the only sure-fire way of guaranteeing access to mustering blocks.
“They have a sixth sense. If you nose them up to a swollen river and give them time, they will pick and choose where to enter the water, they will sort out the firmer footing, and steer around the big boulders and deep holes.”
With their half and quarter draught horses Colin believes in breeding “blood over bone,” thoroughbred type stallions over Clydesdale bloodline mares.
They have proved that this cross consistently produces horses with constitution, athletic ability and full siblings “that are as even as peas in a pod.”
Colin says there will always be a market for great looking athletic horses that you can turn out for weeks or months at a time then bring them back into work with no fuss.
The Clydesdale Stud is often out competing at A&P shows and Horse of the Year at Hastings. A team of 17 horses, complete with wagons and sleds provided a feature spectacle at the recent Christchurch A&P show.
Meanwhile Erin runs the tourism side of the station, she says “it’s not really Colin’s thing, but the tourists love talking to him and hearing his stories.”
“The accountant said you can’t do this for love, so it’s taken a lot of figuring out, but with the horses not doing a lot of farm work over the summer the tourism side fits well in there,” says Erin.
“Our track is full of variety for the farm tour wagon ride, it’s breathtaking landscape of rivers, tussocks, mountains and glaciers is a unique experience.
“A lot of cruise ship tourists from Timaru and Lyttleton are coming in. We have to book the tourism around the busy farm schedule, so we are booked well ahead, especially with the cruise ships.
“It’s just such a magical landscape that is even better experienced at the horses pace.”
There are challenges in all that Colin and Erin do at Erewhon, but they agree “the good days far outweigh the bad days.”
One of the biggest challenges Colin says is the weather.
“Such a long winter with a short growing season; there is a lot of cost associated with winter feed and we are feeding out 180 days of the year, while dealing with the rivers; often the Clyde splits us in half.”
The emphasis is on the way of life. The variety on Erewhon means no two days are the same.
“The river levels dictate farm life. It’s not rocket science running these places,” says Colin. “It’s just trying to physically be able to do the work when the weather allows and when it needs to be done. We work to jobs that need doing; not work to a watch, and there is satisfaction at the end of every week.”
“Just being at the end of the road is pretty awesome,” says Erin.
“We are both lucky we both love it as much as each other. Waking up to it every day is pretty damn awesome.”
As they ponder the future looking out over the station from the new homestead they moved into over winter, they both agree: “to work at the end of the road needs a fantastic attitude to love the life.”
Erewhon traditionally, with its working horses, brings its past into the present.
“We want to see it keep running like this. The new house is future proofing that as we look ahead, as we age, with a married couple now and eventually a head shepherd, we can stand right here and oversee it all.”
Back to Real Farmer