Chapter 27 - After the War

When the wheel was discovered, life was completely altered in the primitive villages of the western world, but the new technology introduced after the war changed attitudes and lifestyles on New Zealand farms even more radically. After years of being in the doldrums, the government Experimental farm at Ruakura, with Dr McMeekin as the guiding star, was discovering, inventing and altering the face of the Waikato. He talked about the psychology of the cow. “He says we should cull for temperament as well as production,” Fred observed. “And he might be right. I suppose you don’t remember Spotted devil, one of the first cows on the place.” “I certainly do!” retorted Esther. When I was helping in the shed during the time when Sam was at the war (the First World War), she was my greatest trial. Even Scout sometimes missed her as she dogged around the stumps, and when she was in the shed I had such a lot of trouble making sure she didn’t come into my bails.

We called her first heifer calf ‘Little Devil’ and she kicked as much as her mother,” Fred remarked, but Esther interrupted “Her next one was worse. Taipo was what we called her, and she was. Even as a calf. She almost broke my finger when I was trying to teach her how to drink. When she came in, she was tough to milk, and was always bunting and horning the others. I was almost glad when she broke her neck over one of the stumps. We were never sure whether she attacked the stump by mistake or whether the others ganged up and pushed her into it.” “It was a tough job to skin her and cook her for the pigs,” Fred remembered, “and it was little enough recompense for all the trouble she had been.” “Don’t tie their legs.” “Don’t strip them after the machines have been on.” “You can look after nearly twice as many cows with a herring bone shed.” Advice came thick and fast. Older Farmers were dubious, but the new ideas worked. Farmers were urged to work on overdraft. It’s the best way, the young men were told, and when the more cautious hung back, they were left behind. Perhaps the most important things were pumps that kept water in the troughs, and sprays for the weeds, especially blackberry and gorse, and drenches to correct deficiencies like copper and fertilizer to make the grass grow began to be freely available. Soon it was whispered that maybe a hundred cows could be milked in one shed.

There was still a need to identify cows for herd testing, but instead of Daisy or Mabel, it became No 64 with a tag in her ear. Somehow it made a difference. Fred was feeling depressed. His back was very painful. “Too much heavy lifting,” said the physiotherapist, and now there was a strange heaviness in his chest. Mary & Alec had gone to live in Tauranga, Alex & Bill were busy on their own farm, Edith was on holiday in Europe, and Rewa was missionary nurse in the Solomon Islands. Had all his toil been just a waste of his life?” he wondered. He and his wife were going around the sheep in the car. When he opened the door to let Esther in, Scot the sheep dog jumped in to and sat in the front seat. “Oh no Scot, get out. You have to go in the back today.” With her tail between her legs and ears drooping, Scot got into the back seat, dejection in every line of her supple body. She sat as far forward as she could, and pushed her head between Fred and his wife. “I give up, Scot, you can have the front seat and I’ll sit in the back,” Esther said. A delighted dog took her place, sitting upfront beside her beloved master, grinning at the animals they passed and sometimes looking over her shoulder to say quite clearly to the lady behind her, “I’ve got my man.” The car went fairly easily over the paddock. The lambs were doing well. The ewes were mostly Romney’s mated to Southdown rams.

Fred had experimented with Dorset horned rams, but although the new trace elements were making an unbelievable improvement to the pasture growth it was still necessary to get the lambs away before the grass dried up early in the new year. Esther suddenly said, “Do you remember writing to me, that first year, and saying that a pukeko would be bogged in this paddock? You could not even walk over it. “It was several years before we could ride across it.” Now it must benefit hundreds of people each year with what it produces,” Esther mused. Think of all those who will enjoy the pounds of butterfat, or our fat lambs, and the woolen blankets. Do you know how many fleeces it takes to make a blanket? Fred said, “I think most of our wool is made into carpets.” His wife gave a little chuckle. “Well families nowadays seem to think carpets are a necessity. Do you remember how proud we felt when we got a carpet for the sitting room? She could still recall the thrill the carpet gave her, though perhaps the linoleum for the kitchen had been of greater benefit. The kitchen had been part of the original shepherds hut, and they had chopped up their kindling on the floor, making it very uneven. Fred smiled at her. “You made such a good job of preparing the sheepskin rugs that I never thought our floors looked bare.” They passed a heap of stumps, straggly manawa logs, “Yanked out by money (with a bulldozer) not our hard labour,” commented Fred. No one had ever attempted to estimate when they had been living trees. “We’ll burn them in winter.”

Esther knew that her husband had lobbied for nearly 20 years to have the area gazzetted a fire district, so that fires could not be light during the danger time of extremely dry weather. Now the summer heat was easier to bear when the skies were blue, and the acrid smell of burning peat did not permeate everywhere. Also there were not so many winter fog blankets either. The sprays for blackberry and the satisfactory returns we are getting for our produce make it worthwhile to farm the land properly. “There are only the two of us these holidays. It seems silly to take the car all the way to Wellington. Let’s fly,” suggested Fred. When they arrived at the airport and saw the plane that was to take them on their first flight, Esther said, “Do you remember how small and fragile the “Southern Cross” looked? It had gone around the world alright, but when Mary went up with Kingsford Smith, I held my breath all the time she was up in the air.” Fred said, ”It was about 1921 or thereabouts, that I took you and your Mother, she must have been here on holiday, to see one of the first planes land at Rukahia. We had to take Duke & Lassie in the buggy because when the plane came over our farm, Jock just leaped all the fences and vanished into the swamp. We looked everywhere and could not find him, so were very glad indeed to see him back in a paddock about a week later.

It was a faultless flight, but as they were coming into land, Fred said, “You know I always said I’d buy one of these things when they could land in our hay paddock, but I don’t think I could learn to fly one and somehow I don’t really want to now. Esther’s heart missed a beat. She wasn’t used to hearing her husband admit he couldn’t attempt something.