Max Tweedie and his wife Lucy farm at Tutira. Their Hallmark Angus stud is run across Mokara and Pa Hill farms, totalling 990 ha of medium to steep pumice hill country, with some easier land for fodder crops. It has one of the largest, highly recorded stud herds in the country.
REX has been in touch with Tweedie regularly since Cyclone Gabrielle hit his farm hard earlier in the year.
He told REX hosts Hamish McKay and Rebecca Greaves that since Cyclone Gabrielle, there have been a lot of worries that the bull sale might not have been able to go ahead with potential access issues and damage done to so much of the rural East Coast in particular.
"It's been anxious for about four months.
"Can we do it, can't we, what's our option b, option c, how can we possibly host this?"
Tweedie wanted to create more awareness about just how hard these properties have been hit by Cyclone Gabrielle and show that there is so much more work to go into reparations to get rural businesses in particular back to the level they were at before all the rough weather.
"We wanted to show people what's been going on where we are, tell that story and how isolated we still are.
"Not everyone could get there easily but we got them there."
Tweedie and a number of others from the local community recently created a newly incorporated society called the Guardians of Tutira & Districts to help support those who had been most impacted by the cyclone.
They managed to raise over $5500 at the bull by auctioning off items such as a helicopter ride, two nights at the QT Museum Hotel and much more.
At the two-year-old bull sale, they were able to sell more than 90% of their bulls, including their most expensive sale of $15,000 for a single Angus bull.
"We managed to sell all but a handful, which was major because we were jumping up from previously selling 30-odd bulls to now selling over 50," Tweedie said.
"Great result for us and well celebrated afterwards."
Listen to the full chat between Tuitara Farmer Max Tweedie, Rebecca Greaves and Hamish McKay above.
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