Hawke's Bay's plays its part in record UK lambs shear

Nick Greaves and wife Kate in Napier in 2022. Photo / NZME

A record bid conceived during about eight seasons working in Hawke's Bay woolsheds has resulted in an English farmer and shearer posting the biggest tally ever shorn in an official record bid anywhere in the world.

Staffordshire shearer Nick Greaves on Friday shore a United Kingdom record of 881 lambs in nine hours, 96 more than the 785 shorn in 2019 by fellow Oxfordshire shearer Stu Connor, who in July last year shore a world record of 872.

Lambs for world record attempts must carry an average weight of at least 0.9kg, and have a top knot (wool atop the head). But, catering for the different breeds and smaller flocks in Britain, the conditions for UK records do not require a top knot, and only an average 0.8kg of wool per sheep is required.

Working for Napier shearing contractor Brendon Mahony and as part of a record preparation which the Covid-19 crisis stretched out to about three years, Greaves shore 763 of Tarawera Station's toughest pumiced sheep lambs in a blow-out in January 2020 - notable for the conditions in which he used 42 combs and more than 200 cutters. In otherwise normal conditions he could have expected to use no more than 40 cutters in the day.

By comparison, he used just two combs on Friday, regrinded for each of the runs during the day, and just 36 cutters.

The next-highest tallies shorn in lambs records shearing were the world record marks of 867 shorn by Irish shearer Ivan Scott in Cornwall in 2016, and the highest in New Zealand, the 866 shorn by Hawke's Bay shearer Dion King in a King Country woolshed in 2007.

Greaves' tally came as he and Welsh shearer and brother-in-law Llyr Jones, who has also shorn in New Zealand - mainly in King Country but also competing at shows in Hawke's Bay - shore a UK two-stand record of 1717.

With Jones shearing 836, they smashed the previous UK record of 1457 by Welsh shearers Gareth Daniel and Ian Jones in 2016. The two-stand record under world record conditions is the 1637 shorn in 1999 by Porangahau gun Rod Sutton and Taupo's Nigel Brown, who has been based in Australia for many years.

The latest record had been three years in the making for Greaves, who had originally intended doing the record in mid-2020 with fellow England shearer Dean Nelmes, who has also worked in Hawke's Bay.

English shearer and regular Hawke's Bay season worker Nick Greaves on his way to a tally of 881 lambs in nine hours in the UK last week. Photo / Supplied

Greaves had intended returning to Hawke's Bay for main shear, starting in November, but will remain in the UK to take on increased responsibility on the family farm.

But he expects to return to New Zealand for at least one more season, possibly including a world record attempt.

"Records?" Greaves said. "I've always loved watching and I've loved every minute of training for ours, the tension, the nerves leading into it and the racing of the clock on the day.

"So, yes, records are not off the cards for the future, nor is a world attempt," he said, recognising being able to source a better line of sheep in New Zealand due to there being more options of the right breed for the world attempts and bigger selection.

"But there's nothing like a home crowd on your own farm bringing you through the afternoon," said Greaves, who had partner and now wife Kate with him wool-handling in New Zealand, as well as heavily involved in the record.

"You're literally running off adrenaline."

Among the previous records he's seen and helped with were former Hawke's Bay shearer Matt Smith, doing a world record of 731 strongwool ewes in nine hours in 2016 at Trefrank Farm, where he farms in Cornwall, and the 644 ewes in eight hours on the same farm by brother and Maraekakaho shearer, farmer and agricultural contractor Rowland Smith a year later.

World Sheep Shearing Records Society secretary Hugh McCarroll currently has four world record attempts officially notified over the next few months, starting with English shearer Marie Prebble's plans to establish women's strongwool ewes record for eight hours in Cornwall on August 25.

New Zealand shearers Reuben Alabaster, of Taihape, and Jack Fagan, of Te Kuiti, will on December 20 and December 22 respectively make separate attempts on the men's eight hours strongwool lambs record of 744, set by Ivan Scott in New Zealand almost 10 years ago.

On February 4 next year, King Country-based shearer Sacha Bond, who went to school at Tararua College, Pahiatua, will attempt the women's eight-hour strongwool lambs record in Southland, targeting the mark of 510 shorn by mainly New Zealand-based Canadian shearer Pauline Bolay in Port Waikato woolshed in 2019.

For the record, Greaves, now 27, started at 5am and shore 196 lambs in the first two hours to breakfast and 173, 172, 171 and 169 lambs in the successive one hour 45 minutes run to the end at 5pm - averaging almost 98 an hour, or just under 36.78 seconds a lamb, caught, shorn and despatched.

But the record is already under challenge, with Welsh Shearer Lloyd Rees making an attempt on Friday.