Shearer

Craig Wiggins: Welcome back to the Farmer's Voice. We're back in the Hawkes Bay, and we're going to look at Rowland Smith. He's going to tell us how to safely shear sheep.

Craig: In the past animal activists have portrayed shearers as being cruel. What are your thoughts?

Rowland Smith: I think they're dwelling on the one percent factor that doesn't really happen at all. They're hunting it out to find out. No, it's not the way shearing is. We strive to do the best we can. We've got training systems in New Zealand, improving all the time. And look, it's beneficial for us to be better.

Craig: Rowly, I'd like to introduce people that aren't aware of how sheep are shorn into some the equipment, can you explain what we have there?

Rowland: On my right here is the cover comb which we use in the winter. It's got bigger gaps in the teeth here. And in my left hand is a normal comb for the warmer months. The reason we use a cover comb is to leave more wool on the sheep so it goes out to the colder weather with plenty of wool left on so it's happy outside.

Craig: What length of wool will that cover comb leave?

Rowland: It leaves about 10mms on will a fluffy finish over the top.

Craig: So Rowly, you've set up a handpiece for us here. Please explain a little bit of the technical stuff you're doing here with this handpiece.

Rowland: Yep. So what we're looking at here is to get our lead right so we do not pull and cut the skin. It's just a matter of setting right because we're using a winter comb here.

Craig: Rowly, can you actually pick the skin up with that comb or is it sharpened to a point where it's got those nice lead-in edges.

Rowland: We've rounded the tips over a fractor. So I can role my finger over there and it's going to just let the skin roll over nicely.

Craig: Ok, we're about to watch Rowly shear a sheep and show us just how easy it can be done, and how kind you can do it for the animal's sake.

Rowland: We're making sure we stay calm the whole time.

Craig: Hey, thanks, Rowly. As you've just shown us, shearing is not a hard thing on the animal. Probably a harder on the human at times. We wish you the best of luck for the upcoming shearing season. As far as you're concerned shearing is not only a necessity, it's a good job and can be done well.

Rowland: Yeah, for sure. As we just proved then there's no stress on the animal at all and look the sheep's going to be out there now happily putting on weight, which is what we need to make money.

Craig: And if we didn't shear they'd be in a lot worse condition than if we left them.

Rowland: That's right. It's going to be out there in the cold, too much wool on it, not doing much. Which is not what we want.