46 | Farm tourism gearing up once more Hugh de Lacy The tough times for sheep and beef farming in the 1980s were what prompted the Wairarapa’s Wharekauhau Station, now Wharekauhau Country Estate, to seek a lifeline from the luxury tourism market. Now the once-sprawling station, shorn of half its original 2225ha, is home to an award-winning lodge purpose-built in the late 1990s for the international farm hospitality market, with no fewer than 16 luxury cottages serviced by the centrally located lodge and its staff of up to 30. With Covid-19 beginning to loosen its grip on international tourism, Wharekauhau is once more playing host to a succession of visitors from around the world, but especially from the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia. And as well as enjoying the best of food and wine that Wairarapa produces, the lodge’s guests also get to see a classic New Zealand commercial sheep and cattle farm in operation, and to appreciate the land and sea vistas of Lake Onoke and Palliser Bay. Guests come in by helicopter to a landing bay in front of the lodge, by xed wing plane to the farm’s landing strip, or by way of a one-and-a-half-hour drive from Wellington. The farm was established in the 1840s and for decades the wool was taken out by longboat to ships in the bay. The original ve-bedroom homestead was rst used for the tourist trade when the decision to diversify from livestock was made at a time when farming was struggling low returns for meat and wool. The initial move into tourism proved highly successful, leading to the decision to shift the homestead off its original site to make way for the handsome facility that stands there now. The homestead remains not far away, used for staff accommodation. The Wharekauhau tourism operation is overseen by general manager Richard Rooney, while Bradley Riggs manages the farming side of the business, including running guided tours for guests. There used to be two farms on Wharekauhau but one was sold off some time ago, leaving 1000ha of which about 530ha is effective, running a classic mix of Romney sheep and Angus cattle behind traditional North Island post and batten fences with virtually no electrics. “The main effective area constitutes a very tidy farm of 380ha, 80 percent of it at,” Bradley Riggs says, “while the remaining 150ha is typical rough Wairarapa coastal hills covered in scrub and bush, and running into conservation land. “Pastures are ryegrass and clover, and the only supplements we make each year are 17ha of balage, though we spend a lot on cropping and re-grassing. “We put 30ha into crops each year: chicory and clover for summer feed along with rape, plantain and clover for nishing, and 8ha of kale for winter feed.” RURAL PEOPLE » Wharekauhau Wharekauhau’s 530ha effective farming platform runs a classic mix of Romney sheep and Angus cattle. The farm carries 2000 breeding ewes covered by Gleniti rams from the other side of Lake Onoke, and 140 in-calf Angus cows and 40 replacement heifers. Everything is fattened, and the lambs are sold to Whanganui-based Coastal Spring Lamb and killed by Ovation, while steers are sold privately as weaners. “The main effective area constitutes a very tidy farm of 380ha, 80 percent of it at, while the remaining 150ha is typical rough Wairarapa coastal hills covered in scrub and bush, and running into conservation land.” Proud supplier of farm machinery to Wharekauhau Farm. 300 High Street, Solway, Masterton | 06 370 0390 www.tfmtractors.nz | Shorty 027 294 5010 or James 027 307 2158
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