Rotorua's
Agrodome is a real working/commercial farm-come-tourist attraction.
For sheep lovers like us, it was a real treat.
We started with the farm
tour . . . where Mariah got to talk to the sheep. The farm has
several hundred Romney's. Their wool is used for carpets and
upholstery. They are a dual-purpose sheep, so they are also meat
sheep. I found their wool much coarser than Romney wool I have
encountered in the state.
Mariah
got to feed the emu - which were much more tame than those I
encountered in the wild in Australia. These didn't hiss!
I
was surprised at the number of deer grown commercially for venison.
It was easy to tell their paddocks as the fencing much have been
near 10' tall.
Every
farm needs a pig. This is a female because she has no tusks.
Not a creature you want to cuddle up with - especially after
her recent roll in the mud.
Belted Galloway
cattle -- Scottish natives, raised for beef. Also affectionately
known as Oreo cows!We also visited a kiwi fruit orchard while on the farm tour. At first I thought it was a poorly kept vineyard. The closer we got to the orchard you could see that it definitely wasn't grapes, because it was tall. Infact, the kiwi fruit trees are trained on a T-post similar to grapes, but they were tall enough for me to walk under. The fruit is actually picked from under the plant. They will be harvested in May. While in the orchard we also taste-tested kiwi fruit wine, which was surprisingly like Chardonney. It is interesting to note that the fruit is always referred to as kiwi fruit because Kiwi's are the native New Zealanders!
e from
Pacific rim countries (Korea and Japan), but others were from
as far away as various European countries. There were three of
us from Michigan. The show was mainly the introduction and lineage
to the 19 main breeds of sheep in New Zealand, beginning with
the big three: Merino, Romney and Corriedale. An interesting
presentation about the commercial side of the business.
We
had ring-side seats for the shearing. Following the shearing
the presenter passed wool around the audience. I couldn't resist:
I took my souvenir back to the hotel and washed, dried, teased
it with my hands and spun it on the drop spindle. Definitely
not wool I'd like in my sweater/jumper!