On and on it went. At about 6.30 a.m., the sun started to rise and for the first time I got to see my surroundings. It was breathtaking. There was no side to the parlour where the cows walked on and off the platform. As the mist hung over the dew-wet grass, the West Coast Mountain range slowly revealed itself. It was a truly magical sight, and the tedium of the job at hand suddenly evaporated like the morning dew. I savoured the view, watching as, bit by bit, the scene evolved as the curtain of mist retreated and the natural splendour fully emerged.
The sunrise gave me an injection of my own, a burst of energy at knowing that I had broken the back of the herd and was on the home straight. There couldn’t have much more than an hour to go. Then, before I knew it, I saw the last cow stepping onto the platform and then no more. Slowly the platform rotated, and she crept nearer and nearer, and then – jab – and it was all done: 700 cattle vaccinated. Looking at my watch it had just gone 8 a.m. Good job, boy! Find a nice café on the way home for a well-earned breakfast, and then see if Amber has anything else. Hopefully, though, I’d have the rest of the day to myself.
I packed away my kit and took it back to the car in two loads. Nathan and Darren had already started hosing down the parlour, and I heard the engine of the quad bike start up. I guess Mike was getting ready to shepherd the stragglers back to their field and shut the gate. I washed myself off, made my farewells to Darren and Nathan and headed for the car.
I set off out of the farm, down the track, planning to grab a coffee and check in with Amber once I got into Mawheraiti. With that job behind me, I felt pleased with myself. The sun shone through the mist, and the scenery, which had been hidden in the dark, was now visible in its full glory. I wound down the window, turned on the radio and trundled back down the lane. What a great morning!
There didn’t seem to be anywhere to get a coffee in Mawheraiti at that time so I pulled into a layby and found my phone. Odd: I had five missed calls from Amber. I looked through them; first one was at 5 a.m., then 5.10 a.m., 5.30 a.m., 7 a.m. and 7.30 a.m. She must have just been checking I got there OK. I pressed RE-CALL. Amber answered.
‘So how are you? And where have you been?’ she enquired. Odd question, I thought.
‘Fine, fine, job done, all seven hundred cows vaccinated, just in MawHerAteEE, or however you pronounce it.’
‘Mawheraiti! What … you’ve been on the farm and vaccinated all the cows?’ she said, bemused.
‘Yup, all done. Went pretty smoothly. They weren’t expecting me, but it was all fine in the end,’ I said feeling a surge of pride.
‘Interesting,’ Amber replied, then after a pause, ‘How odd. Martin, the farm manager, rang me at 5 a.m. asking where you were.’
‘Odd indeed. Well, I didn’t see a Martin, but I was there, all right, I’ve got seven empty vaccine bottles to prove it!’
‘You found it OK then?’
‘Yup, not a problem. Left in Mawheraiti, second left and then drive to the end of the track.’
‘Yeah, that’s right. How strange. Martin was adamant you weren’t there. Maybe you just missed each other, but I’m not sure how. Let me just call him. I’ll call you right back.’
‘OK,’ I said, and hung up. What was Martin playing at?
Five minutes later my phone rang. It was Amber. She was laughing.
‘Jonny, I’ve just spoken to Martin. I don’t know where you’ve been, but you were definitely not on his farm!’
‘What?’ I said in disbelief. This had to be a wind-up.
‘You’ve just vaccinated 700 of the wrong cattle.’
‘How have I managed that?’ I asked, reeling from this revelation.
‘If you followed my directions, Martin said it must have been his neighbour’s farm.’
‘But how? I followed the track to the end of the road.’
‘Did you turn right into the farmyard through some new galvanized metal gates?’
‘Yeah …’ I said, starting to realize that this might not be a wind-up.
‘Yeah, that’s Martin’s neighbour. His parlour is on a 90-degree bend. The track continues for another 2 km and ends in Martin’s yard.’
‘You’re kidding me! But I didn’t see any other lights from another parlour when I was heading down that track at 4 a.m. It was pitch black, no light pollution, so surely I would have seen the lights from Martin’s farm?’ I gabbled.
‘Martin’s farm is in a valley over the hill, so you wouldn’t have seen the lights.’ She was trying to sound sympathetic, but was still in hysterics. ‘Jonny, you’re hilarious. I told my boss in Invercargill that my very good and experienced friend from England was coming to work for us for a bit and he was delighted. Day one, and you’ve vaccinated 700 – not just one or two, but SEVEN HUNDRED of the wrong cattle … You’ve got to see the funny side to that!’
‘Yeah, I suppose so!’ I said, beginning to smile.
‘Didn’t you think it was odd that they weren’t expecting you?’
‘Well, not really, because one of the guys said that the manager often forgets to tell them stuff like that.’
‘On the bright side, you’ve just earned the practice an extra couple of thousand dollars! Although Simon won’t be too happy when I tell him we’ve just pinched some of his government work! I’ll blame it on my English locum … I don’t think I’ll tell him we were at college together!’
‘So you know whose client that farm was?’
‘Yeah, they’re clients of Dixon Park Vets, Simon Harwood’s practice. He’s always accusing us of trying to steal his clients!’
‘. . . Sorry,’ I mumbled.
‘Don’t worry about it, I’m going to get so much mileage out of telling this story it’s well worth an awkward five-minute conversation. Oh, and you know what you’re doing tomorrow morning, now don’t you?’
That realization suddenly hit me, I would have to trek all the way back out here at 4 a.m. tomorrow to vaccinate the right 700 cattle.
‘Yes,’ I said with a groan. ‘I’m rather afraid I do.’
Holstein cows: fast facts
Bos taurus: Cattle
Distribution: There are two living sub-species of the modern domestic cow – Bos taurus indicus, the zebu, which originated in Pakistan, and Bos taurus taurus, the European cow, which originated in south-east Turkey – but between the two Bos taurus now exists in virtually every corner of the world.
Names: An adult male is called a ‘bull’, a young bull a ‘bullock’, and a castrated male a ‘steer’. A female that has had more than one calf is called a ‘cow’, a female under three that hasn’t calved is called a ‘heifer’ and the young are called ‘calves’. Cattle that are used for draughting are called ‘oxen’. A group of cows is called a ‘herd’.
Life span: About 18–22 years.
Habitat: Open grasslands, but in the wild they will also live in forested areas.
Diet: Their natural diet is grass, but to enhance milk or meat production or when grass is not available, their diet is supplemented with silage (a fermented high-moisture grass crop) or grains (a mixture of corn, oats and barley).