- 15 hours ago
Hyundai Country Calendar Season 61 Episode 14
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00:00A black SUV on a country road, mist hangs in a valley in the distance.
00:05Proudly celebrating 60 years of rural New Zealand.
00:10Hyundai Country Calendar.
00:11The title in white over lush green hills.
00:15The community that bought the local hotel.
00:18It's an icon of Huntable.
00:21It was just a shame to see it sit here and eat dairy.
00:25And the farmers who led the way.
00:28Hamish is not a happy man unless he's got something on the go.
00:31This community is so strong and that's how we survive.
00:36Dairy cows walk purposefully through a field.
00:39Then a river bends at a stony bank lined with trees.
00:42A map of Aotearoa New Zealand, a yellow dot highlights Hunterville.
00:46Panning up clusters of white yarrow flowers to the cows.
00:50Some grazing, some lying down.
00:56A woman in a baseball cap opens a gate.
00:59Cows trot towards her.
01:00Hamish Kavanagh and partner Bex Henderson run a busy farming operation near Hunterville in the Rangiteke district.
01:09These older dairy cows arrived here on a truck last night and are being shifted into the farm's brand new
01:15third home.
01:17The cows wander through the gate. Bex counts them as they pass.
01:2283.
01:2383 I think she said.
01:24So that's 199 is it?
01:27We'll double check it but I'm pretty sure it's not.
01:28We've always done fattening cows, cold cows.
01:32But we've done it outside and feed pads and change paddocks each year and work the manure back into the
01:38soil.
01:38But you get a rainy weekend or a rainy day, you get 50 mils, it's just horrid and it's not
01:44right.
01:47We like this farming, we like machinery, we can do everything ourselves.
01:52We've got 77 hectares and we would not be able to house 800 cows on one property at that time.
02:00So we've changed our whole farming scene.
02:01A long shed structure with chest height walls and an iron roof.
02:05This herd home is our first season.
02:08We've got our own digger and dump truck and quarry and tip trucks so all of the drainage and everything
02:14we undertook ourselves.
02:18The farming system here is based on buying in cattle, providing good food to fatten them quickly and sending them
02:25off again to the works.
02:27The average length of stay is around three weeks.
02:32Some of them are short term, some of them are a bit longer, depends on their condition.
02:37So as soon as they round up, they've put on some weight, then they're off to meet their maker.
02:43Last week we had just over 500 cows come in, so it's a big week.
02:46The cull cows were pouring out last week.
02:50We only had three loads go out last week, but this week's been different.
02:54Four loads go out and just over 200 come in.
02:57The herd home does a great job of protecting the cattle from the elements.
03:02We've seen it in the summer.
03:03We've had a pretty cracking summer this year and you go in the herd home there and she's pretty cool.
03:08It's quite nice.
03:09Quite often duck in there ourselves on a hot day if we're working up here.
03:13Yeah, it is far cooler in there and it's way more comfortable and the cows are happy.
03:18You see them running around and loafing around, they're happy, eh?
03:22Yeah, and I mean at night time you go up for an early morning load and sort of go and
03:26get them in at five o'clock.
03:28The first time we thought they were all dead, they were all lying down.
03:32They were the bulls, weren't they?
03:33And Hamish was like, shit, we've got a bit of a problem here.
03:36Yeah, they were all just down to sleep, but I've never really seen a hundred cattle lying with their legs
03:41out.
03:42They just seem happy and content and I think it's a good thing.
03:47We've only been open for two months, but I think come winter the mud farming, it'll be a no-show.
03:53So it'll be good, they'll be warm in the winter, better utilisation of feed, they'll be happy.
03:59Blades of a plough dig into the brown, clumpy floor surface.
04:02The floor of the herd home is a deep layer of waste woodchips from nearby forestry blocks.
04:08And every day they turn it over to aerate it.
04:14We're ripping every day, once a day.
04:16It normally takes us, if there's two of us here, 40 minutes, half an hour.
04:20We take all the cows out, run the rippers through, aerate the woodchip and perlines, they're 800 mills deep.
04:29And it just lets it break down, let the poo and the urine get through and it's all clean and
04:35dry.
04:36And then it breaks down over a certain amount of time and it'll become like topsoil
04:39and then we'll put it back on our paddocks as natural fertiliser.
04:45They've got shelter in a cold day, they've got shade on a hot day,
04:49and if it's a really hot day I'd rather be in there than out there.
04:53Inside, Bex drives the tractor towing the plough.
04:56Got to get it to 50 degrees, that's the ideal temperature for it to do its composting.
05:01Maybe 15, 18 months time this will go back on our soil, back on our farm, fertiliser.
05:06Content cows stand inside the herd home as others wait in a pen outside.
05:11Although Hamish and Bex have plenty to keep them busy on the farm, they've recently gone into hospitality.
05:18The White Art Deco Argyle Hotel on Hunterville's main road.
05:22And they're not just dabbling in a bed and breakfast, they rallied the community to buy the town's hotel.
05:28Crowds at outdoor tables.
05:30It was our local for years and years. It had been on the market for two years.
05:35I said to Bex, let's, you and I buy, no.
05:38I said, no, Hayne, we're not buying a pub.
05:41Um, definitely not.
05:43And he said, look, let's put it out to the community and make it a community event.
05:47We just sent a blanket email out to everyone.
05:5154, wasn't it? 54 emails?
05:5254 emails. I think we got two declines.
05:55Minimum input was five grand each.
05:58And that gave you one share and one vote.
06:00People enjoying a drink on the back deck.
06:03Structurally it was pretty good.
06:05Inside, I think we took one wall out.
06:07It just needed a really good makeover.
06:10So we did a year of renos.
06:12We brought in October 2024 and opened October 2025.
06:16We had builders, plumbers.
06:18We rewired the whole building.
06:20You know, we've done more than what we ever anticipated,
06:23but we thought, let's do it once, do it right.
06:25We were going to do it in stages, weren't we?
06:27And a lot of shield. Community work.
06:28Huge. Huge.
06:29We would have saved a couple on the brand because everyone got their back in.
06:34Working bees. Working bees.
06:36In a real community project.
06:37Yeah, and it was fun.
06:38And it brought everyone together because this community is so strong
06:43and that's how we survive.
06:44It doesn't matter if you're 15 to 75 or 105.
06:49You're all equal.
06:52We had accommodation.
06:54We took them out, put the two retail and a hairdresser out the front.
06:57Beautiful accommodation down at the station hotel.
07:00So let's do something different.
07:03Work all together.
07:04Yeah.
07:04We're not doing accommodations.
07:06Let's see a gig.
07:06So that's cool.
07:09This is a beautiful pub.
07:11I mean, it's an art deco icon of Hunterville.
07:14And it was just a shame to see it sit here and...
07:17Go to Wreck-N-Roon.
07:19We need this because all these small towns are dying.
07:23A band plays on a bandstand structure out the back.
07:30This is Andrew Lambert and John McKnight and Noel.
07:34They started the Hunterways in 1990 and they were a pretty cool band.
07:40Andrew's a farmer.
07:41John McKnight was a farmer here.
07:43Noel was a leather maker in Oanaere.
07:46And they haven't played for 11 years properly.
07:49So they've regrouped because they're all shareholders.
07:52One off gig.
07:55When we bought the pub, all Andrew said to us was,
07:57I want to be the first gig at the Argyle.
08:01We opened October.
08:02October through to January was super busy.
08:06We obviously had quite a lot of publicity,
08:08which brought a lot of out-of-towners to town.
08:11And I think the shops are well supported.
08:13No, it's pretty cool.
08:16And as for having any hospo experience...
08:20Nothing.
08:20And that probably was my biggest fear.
08:22Like, yeah, going in blind.
08:25Not sort of knowing what we did.
08:27So did the project manage of it.
08:29Mine would be just being told to go home.
08:33Having too many and that's enough.
08:36So I'm Tom Hamish.
08:44And from country music to heavy metal,
08:47there's a whole other business that keeps them busy.
08:50A digger at the side of a river.
08:54A load of buckets scoops wood chips from a pile,
08:57then drifting over the long herd home shed.
09:01At Hamish Cavanagh in Bex Henderson's farm north of Hunterville,
09:06feeding the cattle in the herd home is a twice daily ritual.
09:11They're getting a pretty good go for their last three weeks.
09:14They can eat as much as they can.
09:16They've got ad-lib food.
09:18Good high-powered mace, grass silage, carrots, potato.
09:23So they're getting a good balance.
09:28Bex's daughters, Chloe and Brooke, are key to the farm operation.
09:32This morning, Brooke's on the loader,
09:34mixing the silage and supplements
09:36and making sure the cattle get there five a day.
09:39Carrots and potatoes.
09:41We get some off a grower down in Cheltenham.
09:44We count the ones from Cheltenham ourselves in our own tip trucks,
09:47but the truck that just came in, he goes to the market.
09:50Down in Palmerston North, they grow in an Owakuni,
09:52so he just drops them off on the way past.
09:54So it makes a bit of sense.
09:56Tipping feed from a tractor into the feeder at the edge of the building,
10:00the cows lean over to feed.
10:01They know what maize silage is,
10:05because that's what they feed a lot on the dairy farm and supplement.
10:08And they just fed them well on this feed
10:11and it makes sense to do it,
10:14to make our land profitable.
10:19They're just well fed and you can just see them all sitting down
10:22and happy and just calm and collected.
10:25Not bellowing, you can't hear a word at the moment from them,
10:28so that's a good sign.
10:29A bright-eyed black cow blinks her long eyelashes as she feeds,
10:34then drifting above the long shed as the tractor moves along,
10:37dumping feed into the channel for the cows to eat.
10:40More silage is dropped into the tractor's red trailer bin.
10:44Eight scoops of maize silage per day eats away at the stag,
10:48but Hamish and Bex have a sharecropping arrangement
10:51with Sam and Sarah Horrocks who farm down the road.
10:55A forager moves through tall maize plants,
10:57leaving a clean-shaven path.
10:58It's 50-50.
10:59It's all been weighed.
11:01And then we work out the weights and the dry matter
11:03and he gets paid on the yield and the weight.
11:06Chopped maize is blown into a truck's trailer.
11:08This is a new machine for us.
11:10This is our first day with it.
11:14The maize crop is 12 kilometres south of the family farm,
11:18so it's quite a distance for the tractors and trailers to drive.
11:23It's a 24k round trip.
11:26It takes a bit of time.
11:30There's nine pieces of kit, five tractors, two trucks, a stack tractor and the silage chopper.
11:41Bex's daughter Brooke is subbing in and giving Hamish a break from driving the harvester.
11:46It's all going good.
11:48Is that fudge?
11:50Yep.
11:52It started out in my school holidays when I was at high school.
11:55I drove the loader down in the metal pit.
11:58And then I left school when I was 17 and actually went driving it full time for two years.
12:04And then I've always just helped out on the farm and that and driving tractors and, yeah, soon just picked
12:11it up.
12:12After one piece of machinery, yeah, it all seems pretty similar.
12:17I actually had only driven a harvester for the first time this season when Hamish brought one.
12:24I'd never even sat in one.
12:26When he brought our old one, he was like, you're going to learn to drive it and everything.
12:31And then, yeah, I did a little bit in it.
12:34And now I've got the new one.
12:36It's a lot newer.
12:38A bit more fancy, a bit more tech, got cameras and everything.
12:42It makes life a lot easier, really.
12:45Drives better.
12:47Has an aircon and a radio.
12:48Don't have to have the door open.
12:50No, it's cool.
12:52The herd home with silage piles next to it, trees and hills behind.
12:56A tractor with a trailer dumps out the maize silage.
12:59Back at the farm, the new silage stack is growing fast.
13:07As the constant stream of trucks, tractors and trailers rumbles past on the driveway,
13:13Bex and her daughter Chloe are weighing bulls and sending the heavies off to the works.
13:18Bex releases a gate to let a bull through.
13:21A tractor towing a trailer drives past the pens.
13:26Hamish has a background in trucking.
13:28So along with the farm and the hotel, they run a transport business, Kavana aggregates.
13:34Drifting above a river lined by a pale cliff.
13:37The Rangiteke River winds its way from the central plateau down to the sea of Tangimoana.
13:44And as it passes the farm, it provides a constant source of stone.
13:49A digger scoops stone and tips it into a truck.
13:51This is our aggregate side of the business.
13:53We're extracting at the moment off the riverbed.
13:56So we've had quite a good flush through in that last weather event.
14:00End of February, we had quite a good flush and quite a good drop of rock.
14:04We're digging that up, ready for crushing.
14:05Our supplies are getting pretty low in the metal pit.
14:08So time to bring the crusher back in.
14:11The truck carries the stone to a larger pile near the river.
14:16We have a consent for so many ton we can extract from the river.
14:20And then we get our metal all tested.
14:22It goes to test lab in Whanganui to certain specifications.
14:25A digger scoop glides into the bottom of a rock pile, scooping upwards.
14:30We supply New Zealand rodines.
14:32So down, it takes quite a lot of our metal for the district.
14:34A lot of it goes to the forestry.
14:36The bigger rock, the AP80, low fine 100, AP65, all goes into the forestry.
14:41Forestry is huge here in Hunderbolt at the moment.
14:50But the next job in their busy lives is heading to the local livestock sales to buy more cattle.
14:58Livestock sales to buy more cattle.
15:02Drifting towards sale yards, Fielding's flat township stretches beyond.
15:06Fielding has one of the largest sale yards in the southern hemisphere.
15:11Monday is sale day for cull cows.
15:14And it's a weekly fixture in the diary for Hamish Kavanagh and his partner Bex Henderson's daughters, Chloe and Brooke.
15:2152, 52, 52, 3.52.
15:23We come down here to buy the cull cows.
15:26They're just a bit expensive today.
15:29They're dearer than last week. There's a big line up.
15:38We've got to get it back. It's dearer than last week.
15:42More people.
15:43Yeah, a few more people, a few more cows.
15:46So it's making a difference growing, yeah.
15:48Still a lot of pens to go though.
15:51Yeah, there is.
15:54These ones coming in.
15:565.15.
15:5790 is here. 92.
15:59You've got to set yourself a price on what you want to be at and what your price is going
16:03to be for the next couple of weeks because the schedule's on its way down.
16:05So we don't want to be paying too much.
16:1082, 82, 82, 82, 84, 86, 88, 290.
16:1790 is left.
16:18$2.90.
16:19All over for 290.
16:23Hamish.
16:24We're on the board.
16:25Yeah, they are a nice, shiny, healthy cow.
16:28Paid a bit much for them but by the time we put 50 kilos on them, boom.
16:35Making money.
16:37Hamish and the girls have secured some cows, although not as many as they wanted.
16:42Well hopefully after a couple of hundred but I don't think we'll get there.
16:45It's just the price is up a little bit and the market should be softening more but just the way
16:51it is.
17:01Back home in Hunterville, the next task is to select some of the heavier cows to go in the truck.
17:08There's 580 cows in there, we're going to draft the fats out of them.
17:11So we're looking for where the hip bones are all rounded over.
17:15Can you skinny?
17:17The last one.
17:21Well done.
17:22We have one on the gate, one picking them out.
17:26First one.
17:27The fats go one way, the lights go back in the shed.
17:31Yeah, the old one gets passed every now and again but they'll get caught next week with the next load.
17:3851.
17:39How many?
17:4051.
17:41Then they just wander up the lane to the cattle yards and we'll load the truck.
17:48The cows head up the race to the truck.
17:52They go to Tikawiri to Universal Beef Packers.
17:55That's who we supply.
17:57So this week we've got four loads going there.
18:01Brook's shout, there's one left.
18:04Yeah, I couldn't count properly.
18:09Some you get fat already and so they might only be here a couple of days.
18:14Ten days normally we try to keep them for, just for their health and everything.
18:21Generally an animal's here for about three weeks, yeah.
18:24All depends on the condition of the animal.
18:27The truck winds down the driveway then along a verdant country road.
18:34And with the truck away, the family's back at the local Argyle Hotel.
18:40Since the community bought it in 2025, it's been humming.
18:45And Hamish and his partner Bex Henderson are hosting a get together for the families who chipped in to buy
18:50it.
18:52Tonight's our shareholders night.
18:54This is three months since our AGM back in December.
18:56So it's just a catch up.
18:58Hamish will brief everybody how we're going, what's happened, what's going to happen, some events and stuff like that and
19:04just going forward.
19:05Just a good way to keep the group and the shareholders all together and celebrate what we have here.
19:11Canapes in the kitchen.
19:12There will probably be about a hundred here tonight.
19:14We always invite the families of the shareholders to these events because that's what it's all about, you know, the
19:20community side of things.
19:22Children play on the lawn.
19:24I'd like to hand over to Craig Clare from ASV.
19:29Hey, Sean Sharp.
19:31Just want to say what a wicked way and initiative to, you know, bring together the community.
19:36Hopefully a blueprint with other communities out there.
19:41And it's been an absolute pleasure working with Hamish and Bex and all the other directors.
19:46Thank you very much.
19:48There's no way this would have happened without Hamish and Bex.
19:53And we all owe them a great deal of bloody gratitude.
20:02A fire crackles on a rock on a lawn looking down on the river.
20:07Family, friends and strong communities are important to Hamish and Bex and the hotel punt seems to have paid off.
20:16I think it seems to have brought the community back together.
20:19Especially the shareholders.
20:21Everyone's saying that their shops are a bit busier and things are a bit more positive.
20:25More traffic stopping, the through traffic, which is what we're really trying to capture.
20:29Put Hannibal on the map.
20:30The full moon hazy in the sky, a cow silhouetted in the setting sun.
20:34With the new improved Argyle Hotel up and running, luckily there's plenty of work on farm to keep them both
20:41busy.
20:43You've probably got about six months here, haven't you, just to fine tune everything and get everything right.
20:48You know, we're still not 100% finished yet.
20:51Hamish is not a happy man unless he's got something on the go.
20:54It's not really work if you enjoy it though, is it?
20:57If it's a chore then you shouldn't be doing it.
21:00Standing around the rock fire.
21:02There's a massive team behind us that couldn't do it without.
21:05Yeah, we're very lucky. Really lucky.
21:08The ashy wood of the fire glows orange, the moon is bright in the darkening sky.
21:15Celebrating 60 years in an old film gate style graphic.
21:19Jim Morris is a mixture of high country reserve and high country romance.
21:25He was still in short trousers when he first saw this rugged mountain valley at the headwaters of the Rakaia.
21:31But the city boy from Christchurch was enchanted.
21:34Well, I got a job when I was a bit of a kid up at Glenariff, which is just down
21:39the gully of it in the school holidays.
21:42That was the start of it. That was about 1963.
21:46I just kept coming back.
21:49To see the rest of this classic episode and more gems from the past 60 years, head to TVNZ+.
22:00The end credits under scenes of the cattle and hens, in the herd home and in paddocks.
22:06Audio description by Able and made with the support of New Zealand On Air.
22:10For more information go to able.co.nz
22:28Country calendar was proudly brought to you by Hyundai New Zealand.
22:32On Air.
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