Monthly Archives: October 2014

Life on the Farm

Classes are over now and finals season has begun! Finding a spot to study during finals is not easy. With over 20,000 students, every single seat in the library and study centers gets snatched up early in the morning.  I have a final in Maori Society tomorrow, Environmental Politics on Saturday, and then I’ll have 3 weeks until my last final in Plant Ecology. I find it strange how spread out their finals schedule is, there is almost a full month for finals. I’m not really sure what the reasoning is, but it certainly is less stressful than our usual one week of finals. I’m hoping to find some trips to tag along on during my large gap in finals, I’ll just have to wait and see what comes up.

In other news, I got to visit a sheep farm! It was so much fun! My friend Vic’s family owns a farm in Cromwell and she offered to take Betsy and I up there to experience life on the farm for a couple days. We left at 6am in order to get to the farm at 8am (Vic’s dad said he would start the rounds late if we could get there by 8am). So we all hopped in the truck, caked with mud inside and out, dog and cages on the back and began the rounds of the sheep paddocks. The back of the truck had a little pen with hay for the lost lambs that get picked up, a larger cage for mama sheep that need to get picked up, as well as a spot for Pete, the dog.

Betsy and I ready for action on the farm

Betsy and I ready for action on the farm

Most of the lambing was already done by the time we were there, only a few of the first time mama sheep hadn’t given birth yet. They do ultrasounds on all of the sheep and split them up into paddocks of sheep that are going to have one lamb and sheep with twins, the first time moms are also separate as they usually give birth a little later. We cruised through all of the hilly paddocks searching for lost lambs and in some paddocks for sheep in labor.

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Lambs acquire a scent from drinking their mother’s milk, which is how a sheep knows which lamb is her own. If a lamb gets separated from it’s mother before it is able to acquire a scent it will die, so lost lambs need to get picked up. If they can tell which one it’s mother is (I could never tell) then they pick up the mother as well and put them both in a pen together for a while so that the lamb can acquire the scent from the milk. Lost lambs without a mother are paired up with sheep that have lost a lamb. The sheep is put in a headlock in a pen so that the lamb can drink without being pushed away or the sheep’s original lamb is skinned and the fur is worn as a jacket on the new lamb so that it has the scent of the original lamb. Who knew sheep have such a strong sense of smell?

Finding sheep ready to give birth was really exciting. When they spotted a sheep in labor, the chase would begin. Sheep are shockingly fast, I never would have guessed. They speed around in the truck, bouncing up and down the hills in the paddock, chasing the sheep trying to cut off it’s path. Once there is only one sheep around they yell “go Pete!” and pete jumps off the back of the truck and chases down the sheep. He grabs the sheep by the ear and slows it down until someone can jump out of the car and tackle the sheep. One of the sheep we chased was so fast the dog took a while to catch it, we cut off it’s path and it rammed right into the side of the truck. That slowed it down enough for Pete to grab it’s ear and for Vic to jump out of the truck and grab it. The person that grabs the sheep flips it over and holds it on it’s back while the other pulls out the lamb by it’s front legs. The second time we got a sheep Vic looked up at me and said “pull it out now Julia!” and there was no time to think, so I got in there and pulled out the warm, slimy little lamb! Once birthed, the mama and baby are put in a small pen together for a day to give the baby a chance to learn how to feed and acquire it’s scent.

Vic wrangles the pregnant sheep as her dad and Pete the dog follow behind. To the left of Vic and the sheep you can see the small pen that the mother and new born are kept in for a day or so after birth,

Vic wrangling the pregnant sheep as her dad and Pete the dog follow behind. To the left of Vic and the sheep you can see the small pen that the mother and new born are kept in for a day or so after birth.

We got to bottle feed the lost lambs that hadn’t been paired up with new mothers yet. They are super friendly, they like to snuggle up on people;s laps and trot around happily.

Lunch times for little lambies!

Lunch times for little lambies!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Vic keeps one lamb as a pet each year, and this year it’s Mini Me! She’s a super cute little lamb. She follows Vic everywhere like a little puppy, sits happily on her lap, and comes when called.

Mini walking along with me and Vic

Mini walking along with me and Vic

 

Mini Me posing for the camera

Mini Me posing for the camera

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We also got to herd sheep from one paddock to another, which was actually managed with just the truck and one of the motor bikes. Herding the deer was really different, they’re smarter so you can’t just chase them like the sheep. They would set up one truck ahead of the deer, the person in that truck would do this funny deer call and slowly drive away and then most of the deer kind of just follow along behind.

The deer running towards us over the hill after hearing the call

The deer running towards us over the hill after hearing the call

The other truck is hidden out of sight behind the deer with Diesel, the deer herding dog (they have at least 8 incredibly well trained dogs on the farm each with a very specific job). The truck with the dog tries to scare and chase the deer that get left behind towards the other deer. It was amazing to watch the whole process, they are such a talented family! They know all their animals so well and have it down to a science exactly how to move these huge groups of unwilling animals from one place to anther. The deer were herded to a shed where their antlers were chopped to the appropriate length and then they were loaded onto a two level truck headed to “the works” to be made into venison.

Scaring the deer into the shed

Scaring the deer into the shed

The sheep farm is one of my favorite places I have had the joy of visiting during my time abroad. Vic’s family was incredible. I am in awe of the amount of work they put into their farm and all of the knowledge they have of their work. They don’t even say anything to each other and all of a sudden they’re all jumping out of the car at the same time and flapping things or grabbing sheep.

Thinking about the farm and all the little lambies is getting me through my studying this week!

And a happy Julia

and a happy Julia

 

A happy lamb

A happy lamb

 

Abel Tasman

I’ve been wanting to make it up to Abel Tasman National Park, located at the North end of the South Island, for a long time now. A few weeks ago we realized we didn’t have much time left to make it there. So Wednesday morning we piled into our little car and started making our way out of Dunedin. We didn’t get very far through the hills before the car began overheating and smoking. We got a tow back into town and ended up having to sell it for parts.

RIP
RIP

We used what little money we got from the car to pay for a rental car for the week, so Wednesday afternoon we began our six hour drive to Kaikoura. We had originally planned to have some time to see Kaikoura and kayak with dolphins, but because of our little delay we got there just in time to go to sleep. The other car rolled a couple hours behind us, we were surprised they made it at all! It was a very last minute decision for them to come with us.

We left early in the morning to finish the drive up and took a quick detour down to Split Apple Rock while we were waiting for the other car to catch up. We reserved campsites and a boat ride back to the start of the track for 3 days later.

Split Apple Rock
Split Apple Rock

We split up our tents and group food into all of our packs and minimized our clothing as much as possible, but our packs were still stuffed to the brim and weighed a ton. We were told there was water at the start of the track we could fill up our water bottles with so we waited to fill them up until then. I turned the faucet on and let the water run into my bottle and found just one little problem. It was brown and clearly needed to be boiled or filtered before drinking. I dumped it out, but later we got so thirsty while we were hiking that we filled up our water bottles in a cold stream. It tasted delicious. And no viruses or diseases were contracted.

Splitting up the goods
Splitting up the goods

We set out on our hike mid-afternoon on Thursday happy and energetic. We had 25.7 miles to cover in 3 days. The first day we hiked in about 4 hours to an amazing campsite on a beautiful sandy beach in a calm bay. We were all ridiculously unprepared for camping in the wilderness, but somehow we managed. We all sat around a campfire that night telling stories. It was such a fun group to hang out with, full of laughter.

Hiking out from our first campsite
Hiking out from our first campsite

The second day was much longer, we were on trail for 8 very long hours. The trail was incredible, we walked along cliffs, through the rainforest, past waterfalls and streams, and descended onto countless beautiful sandy beaches. It was coming back up from the beaches that was the problem…

Ready for day 2!
Ready for day 2!

One of the climbs up from the beach to get back onto the cliffs was never ending. At every turn I thought “this one has to be the end” but it just never was. That was the only truly miserable one, but having a huge pack on your back sure makes everything a little more difficult.

The whole crew on trail
The whole crew on trail

We decided to take the low tide track through one bay even though it wasn’t quite low tide yet and ended up having to wade through some pools to get across. It was nice to have such a big group so we could switch up who we were walking with and talk with everyone. We all collapsed when we finally made it to the campsite that night only to get attacked by more sandflies. We went to bed early that night since fires weren’t allowed and we had to get up so early the next morning.

Short cut
Short cut

For our last day on trail we had to be up at 5am to cross the tidal flat at low tide. Luckily our campsite was right on the edge of the flat so we woke up, packed everything up in the dark and headed out as fast as we could with our blisters throbbing in cold, wet boots. The sun began to rise as we ran through the leftover pools of freezing cold water.

Sunrise crossing
Sunrise crossing

We hiked a little further to the next beach and then stopped for breakfast.IMG_6132

Sunrise breakfast
Sunrise breakfast

 

Family photo
Family photo

It looked so tropical with the blue green waters, sandy beaches, and palm trees. You could almost trick yourself into thinking you were on a tropical island until you touched the ice cold water. IMG_6101

We hiked a couple more hours to the pick up point for the boat and arrived about 4 hours early. We hung out in a shelter by the beach to hide from the sandflies and played games and ate our leftover food until the boat arrived. We stuffed our huge group onto the little tiny boat and shoved off.

The little boat we squeezed 20 people and packs into

The little boat we squeezed 20 people and packs into

We immediately spotted a seal swimming in the waves and then a minute later we stopped to watch a feeding pod of dolphins. They cruised in and out of the waves with their babies all around while birds dove into the water to fighting for the fish. It was an incredible site. We also saw a penguin bobbing in the waves all alone.

We jumped in our car and drove as fast as we could back to Kaikoura on the curvy highway. We were showered, fed, and asleep in the hostel by 9pm that night.

With the semester wrapping up, I’m so glad we found the time to take such an amazing trip. I feel so lucky to be in New Zealand this semester and to have such amazing opportunities at my fingertips. Now that we don’t have a car it’s a little more tricky to plan trips, but I’ve had so many amazing adventures already and there really isn’t that much time left. So, we’ll just have to wait and see where the rest of the semester takes me!