By Doug Laing
More than 200 shearers and woolhandlers are expected to be in action during the busiest weekend on the Shearing Sports New Zealand calendar from Friday to Saturday.
The competition will be spread the length of the country.
The Northern Southland Community Shears’ New Zealand fullwool shearing and woolhandling championships will be held in a woolshed near Lumsden on Friday, and the Southland Shears’ national crossbred lambs shearing and woolhandling champs are at the Winton A and P Show on Saturday.
Other events are shearing-only competitions at Kaikohe, Wairoa and Golden Bay on Saturday and the Horowhenua Shearing Championships in Levin on Sunday.
Shearers will also compete at several speed shears in Southland, the Wairoa Shears at Kauhouroa on Friday night, and the new YMP Sports event at Paroa Station near Raupunga.
The busy weekend will be followed on Monday by an attempt on the solo men’s nine-hour lambs shearing record by Bay of Plenty shearer Jamie Skiffington at a woolshed in southern Hawke’s Bay.
It will be a weekend of contrast in Southland....from the shearing of ewes carrying as much as a year’s wool at the fullwool championships on Friday to 30-32kg lambs with barely six months’ wool at Winton the next day.
Shearing Sports New Zealand Southland-Otago delegate Michael Hogan says there will be particular interest from the open-class competitors, who next month start protracted shearing and woolhandling series to decide the New Zealand team members for the 2026 world championships in Masterton.
The series include next year’s Lumsden and Winton event and competitors will want to familiarise themselves with the types of sheep being shorn at the shows and gain an edge for what he expects to be an even more competitive schedule than usual.
Hogan says the vagaries of the season have meant that young sheep like the 1150 lambs crutched and ready for Winton are behind average growth for the time of year, with less weight and wool.
But the shearing season is in full swing in the area, which could impact on the numbers competing at the shows if they put work ahead of the sport.
Hogan said half of the shearers working in the region were from the North Island or overseas.
“With two shows in two days (and national shearing and woolhandling titles available from junior to open class) the turnout can be good,” he said. “But they’ve only had 10 days back at work and they haven’t got sick of it yet. Give them another week and they might be looking for an excuse to take the day off.”
Last year, the major open class titles were shared.
In the shearing, Invercargill’s Nathan Stratford won the fullwool title at Lumsden for a seventh time since 2002, while Masterton shearer Paerata Abraham won his first lambs title at Winton.
Two-time world champion Joel Henare, from Gisborne, also won the Lumsden woolhandling title for a seventh time, while Pagan Rimene won the Winton lambs title for a seventh time as well.
The biggest of the other competitions is expected to be the Wairoa Shears, which have for the second year in a row been moved from the town’s cancelled A&P Show because of the impact of bad weather – about 500mm of rain in the last five weeks – making it difficult for sheep truck access.
The shears will take place in the five grades from novice to open at Kauhouroa Station - between Frasertown and Marumaru - with up to 100 shearers taking part, including many from the UK.
It includes the first round of the new Te Whiringa Senior Shearing Circuit, aimed at strengthening numbers in the senior grade in the North Island. Ten competitions will be held in nine weeks culminating in a final at the Waimarino Shears in Raetihi on March 15.
By contrast, the Kaikohe show shears will merge novice, junior and intermediate shearers into one event, with handicaps based on the number of sheep to be shorn per grade.
Most shearers and woolhandlers competing in Southland will be in action on both days, while some of those competing in the North Island will shear at the Wairoa Shears and then travel about 360km to shear in Levin the next day.
