Early sheep runs in Selwyn

In early colonial times, the Canterbury Plains were sheep heaven for grazing, with rapidly expanding flocks growing a bonanza of wool. Many farmers made fortunes from exporting their clip for textile manufacturing overseas.

Sheep runs were established on the Canterbury plains in 1850 and laid the foundation for the agricultural identity of the Selwyn District. Prior to European settlement in Canterbury, the area was sparsely populated by local Māori who had mainly settled near Te Waihora/ Lake Ellesmere which provided a readily available food source. When the original Canterbury pilgrims arrived in 1850, they were bound by Land Regulations which were contained in the charter of the Canterbury Association, granted to it by the Crown in 1849.

The Canterbury Association extends its power
The Association’s plan depended on the sale of land known as the Canterbury Block, which included all of Banks Peninsula and the plains between the Waipara and Ashburton rivers. The Association had the option of buying the land from the New Zealand Company at 10 shillings per acre. How the company acquired the land remains contentious.
Members of the Association had planned to create a new and better England; a catch-cry they used when promoting British immigration to the new colony. The idea was that those with money to invest would buy portions of the available land and establish large estates, forming a new aristocracy, while the working class could save money and buy small parcels of land to become yeoman farmers.

However, in practice this did not work as much of the land at that time was not suitable for farming. An example of this was the land along the sea coast and around Te Waihora/ Lake Ellesmere which was deep swamp or heavy fern in places where it was wet and covered in flax, toe toe, rushes and cutty grass, with boggy creeks running through it. On the dry areas of the plains there were large tracts where the manuka was so high that a man on horseback could not see over it. In many places there were cabbage trees dotted about, which early settlers believed indicated where good land could be found.

The initial lack of land sales prompted the Canterbury Provincial government to survey around 250 ‘runs', which were areas of land that could be leased out to settlers, known as Squatters, at a cheap rate for grazing and development. The runs within the Selwyn District were mostly only suitable for grazing sheep due to the light soil and lack of water; with one run including the area around Kirwee being known as the ‘Desert'. During the 1850s thousands of Merino sheep were imported from Australia and used to stock the runs in Canterbury.

Establishing a new run
A typical run held between 1000 to 1500 sheep and the squatter had little else when getting established. He usually had a horse or two and a bullock cart loaded with stores and tools. Depending on his wealth he could also employ a shepherd, a bullock driver, and a couple of labourers for fencing and bush clearance.

When taking on the barren land the first thing the squatter did was decide on a location to build a homestead. He would pitch a tent, build a temporary scrub yard to hold the sheep at night until they were used to their surroundings, and then find a local source of timber to build a hut and use for fencing. The early squatters built Cob cottages made from clay mud and tussock, which was readily available and in the style of rural cottages throughout the British Isles at the time. Other conveniences such as woolsheds and drafting yards were also added.

By the time the runs around the foothills and high country were being established, most of the runs on the plains had been purchased. In 1876 the provincial governments were abolished, and the New Zealand Government took over the administration of the Canterbury runs. Runholders who still leased their runs could rent the properties for 10 years, but no longer have pre-emptive rights to re-new the lease once it expired.

The runs were also known as ‘stations’ and originally meant a place at which a squatter stationed himself to work his run. However, the word gradually came to include the whole run, including buildings, land, and stock. The term is still in use to describe a large high-country farm.

New regulations to stop monopoly
In 1894 the Liberal government introduced a new land act that led to a change in the size of some of the original runs in the district. The government had already either not renewed leases or had made compulsory purchases of land for settlement, which included land taken to build a railway network and for settlements such as Darfield, Sheffield, and Dunsandel. The intension of the act was also to reduce the size of the large runs to free up more land for the increasing number of settlers to purchase and to prevent the establishment of a landed aristocracy that many were trying to escape from when leaving Britain.

One example of this was Racecourse Hill Estate (homestead pictured left) which originally comprised of 20,000 acres in 1852. The station eventually took in three runs and had a number of owners until it was purchased by the Maxwell family in 1871. However, like many of the runholders, the Maxwells were absentee landlords in that they mostly lived in England and employed local managers to run the estate.

Over time the fluctuating fortunes of farming saw many station owners having to sell parcels of land off to ensure the properties remained financially viable. This occurred with Racecourse Hill where land was later sold that saw the creation of Bangor and Waireka estates. By the 1940s Racecourse Hill station had been dramatically reduced to only 1,150 acres.

The most famous of the original runs in the district that is still in existence is ‘Homebush'.  The run consisted of 33,000 acres and ran between the Waimakariri and Selwyn rivers. It bordered Racecourse Hill and Waireka runs about a mile or so from the foot of the Malvern Hills, and took in Gorge Hill, running back to Russell’s Flat and the Pig Saddle.

It was taken up by the Deans brothers, John and William, in 1851. These early pioneers from Scotland had initially purchased 400 acres of land at Riccarton before exchanging it for the run which became Homebush. It was originally run as a cattle station but eventually changed over to sheep during the 1870s. In 1910 the large estate was divided amongst the family, and although now much smaller than the original run, significantly, Homebush has remained in the ownership of the descendants of the first runholders for almost 170 years.

The runs, combined with the foresight and tenacity of the pioneering runholders themselves, have left a lasting legacy to the district, where the strength of the local economy is still reliant on agriculture.