A standoff between a dog named Fonz and a steer saved a shepherd who was bunted off his horse.
A rescue helicopter was called to Siberia Station, near Taihape, after a farm worker and his horse Black Betty were attacked by a bull on Thursday afternoon.
James Hemopo was mustering on the station about one hour's ride from home when the bull turned vicious.
It had been eyeballing him the whole way out, 29-year-old Mr Hemopo told the Chronicle.
"It did this quite a few times," he said. "I thought, 'this cow's all s***'.
"Before I knew it, he was right there and I thought, 'He's not taking any prisoners'."
The steer leapt up on his lap, dragging him and his horse Black Betty to the ground.
"I can't remember anything from there ... I'd been dragged about 10 metres."
Mr Hemopo believes he was knocked out for about 10 seconds.
Luckily, the nine working dogs he was with jumped in to help.
"They just held on to the bull and stopped it from charging at me again," Mr Hemopo said.
"If it hadn't been for my dogs, I would have been smoked. It could have turned real bad, I could have been killed." However, the battle wasn't quite over.
A junior shepherd had to go back to the house to call for help - a more than two-hour round trip - and that left Mr Hemopo waiting for the rescue helicopter, with the bull lurking.
One of his dogs, Fonz, got into a standoff with the angry beast, keeping it at bay each time it approached.
"He was in on it big time - he's the man, old Fonzy.
"A man and his dog ... you can't beat it, you forget how valuable they are."
Mr Hemopo, who has been a shepherd for 13 years, was airlifted to Wanganui Hospital with internal injuries and Black Betty was later located "some distance away".
Mr Hemopo was discharged and returned to the station near Taihape yesterday.
But he said he was quite sore and expected to be off work for at least a few days.