Forestry provides financial freedom for immobilised farmer

Harvested logs ready to be trucked away from the Ross farm. Trees in the background awaiting felling were planted 400/ha, fertilised and pruned to 6m.

Fate has dealt Murdoch Ross a few cruel hands. Cerebral palsy linked to problems during his birth in 1950 was the start of it and being run over by the trusty Massey Ferguson 28 tractor he had ridden around Parua Bay for decades was the end of it, as far as walking went.

The tractor had been a sure-fire cure to lift Murdoch's spirits if his cerebral palsy made him feel blue. He could drive it to the top of the airfield on his family farm, pull the throttle wide open and zoom over the grass runway, arms raised for takeoff.

"I liked to feel the wind blowing through my hair," he said.

After the accident the tractor was sold and Murdoch powered down to a mobility scooter, although for many years his longtime friend Ross Wyatt used to take him to Ross Livestock sales at Maungakaramea in a 1989 Nissan Civilian minibus. Ross Livestock, which Murdoch established in 2003, is one of the largest, independently and privately owned auction sale businesses in New Zealand.

The Maungakaramea Public Saleyards Society runs the saleyards as a trust, distributing proceeds after costs to schools and other local organisations.

These days Murdoch, 67, is pretty well confined to a chair at his home in a flat on one end of the Parua Bay Medical Centre he had built in 1991 to extend medical services from Onerahi to his rural community.

He looks back with pride at the contribution which provision of the medical centre has made to community health.

And he is also proud of the way he has grown 33ha of radiata pines in a joint venture with former Whangarei Heads Primary School principal Peter Coates, an experienced farm forester.

"It's a miracle I can sell pine trees," Murdoch said.

The logs now being harvested by Mid North Farm Forestry Association president Peter Davies Colley are expected to bring the immobilised man financial freedom he has rarely experienced because in the past he has felt money made on his farm needed to be channelled to his family.

He views the pine profits differently. They can be for his personal use because the trees have grown on steep slopes unproductive for pastoral farming.

Peter Coates and his wife Nancy won the North Island Farm Foresters of the Year title in 2004. With two colleagues they had bought 71ha of former Ross family farm land on which they planted pines in 1974-86. In those days the Government provided a $1 for $1 Forestry Encouragement Grant Scheme so 1800 trees were planted per hectare. They were pruned and fertilised — but contractors were then hired to thin them to 400 a hectare.

Having three-quarters of the trees felled to waste appalled Mr Coates. When he subsequently planted lines of pines on the Jagger farm at Whangarei Heads to provide stock shade and timber he kept numbers down and concentrated on giving every tree the opportunity to grow.

The Jaggers provided the land and fencing, Mr Coates looked after the trees and they will split 50:50 when the pines are harvested. The same deal applied when in the 1990s Mr Coates began planting 400 stems per hectare on unproductive areas of Murdoch's 125ha farm.

A legal forestry right was drawn up in the mid-90s to protect Mr Coates' share in the 33ha plantation now established should the farm need to be sold. While the Ross farm trees are under the ideal harvesting age of 25-30 years, they have grown well with plenty of light and regular fertilisation.

And Murdoch wants them in his bank account while his deteriorating health allows him to appreciate his big payday. Mr Coates said the Ross trees were not going to make the $47,000/ha top price he had received for some 35-year-old trees. He expected to be dividing $25,000-$40,000/ha before tax with Murdoch once harvesting was completed.

"Growing blocks of plantation pines takes a while but, once you start harvesting them, it's like winning Lotto every two or three years."

Murdoch hasn't revealed what he might do with his money. But he is expected to make an appearance when the Mid North Farm Forestry Association holds a field day at the skid site on his farm alongside Taraunui Rd at Parua Bay at 10am on Sunday.

Field day themes will be harvesting with the National Environmental Standards, financial returns, joint ventures and new forestry initiatives.

For more information on the field day, call Peter Coates on 094365774. All welcome, bring lunch.