Molesworth Station: New Zealand's Biggest Farm and Its High-Country Cattle

What is Molesworth Station?

Molesworth is New Zealand's largest farm, at over 1,800 square kilometres or 440,000 acres. It lies behind the Inland Kaikoura range in Marlborough, with its access road running to Hanmer Springs. The land is owned by the Crown and leased for farming. According to the Wikipedia article on Molesworth Station, it supports the country's biggest herd of cattle, though the article does not give a herd total.

The farm is also a Recreation Reserve, so a working cattle operation and public access share the same ground.

How did Molesworth become one station?

Tarndale and Molesworth stations were amalgamated in 1938 after the runholders walked off the land. In 1949 St Helens station was added to make the present station. The three together had once run about 95,000 sheep. The source does not name the original founders, so none are given here.

On 1 July 2005 administration of the land was handed to the Department of Conservation, which now manages it as a reserve.

What cattle graze Molesworth?

The cattle are Angus and Angus-Hereford cross. They range the high country in summer and graze the warmer valleys in winter. The calving rate is 92 per cent, achieved each October and November. Surplus heifers are sold as two-year-olds and steers as three-year-olds.

The station employs five permanent staff plus about six stockmen, except in winter. At peak times there are around 80 horses and up to 45 working dogs, and aircraft are used to locate cattle at mustering and to pick up any missed. A report from Radio New Zealand on the autumn muster describes about 3,000 cows being gathered from a 60 kilometre stretch of the farm over about a month, split into groups of roughly 900, 1,200 and 600 first-calf cows.

Rabbits, weeds and disease on the high country

Investment in rabbit control brought the land back into production, followed by revegetation. Weed control remains expensive, with briar, broom, wilding pine and hieracium named among the problems. Possums and ferrets can transmit bovine tuberculosis, and the station hosts government research into TB and possums. The HVDC Inter-Island transmission line also passes through the station.

These are costs of high-country farming: land that was grazed out needed years of rabbit control before it could carry cattle at all.

Visit or learn more about Molesworth

The farm sits at an elevation of about 890 metres at Molesworth itself. The 1991 to 2020 climate normals there show a mean annual rainfall of 626.9 millimetres, a record high of 35.1 degrees Celsius in February and a record low of minus 14.0 degrees in June. That spread, from hot dry summers to hard winters, explains why the cattle move between high summer country and warmer valleys.

The Acheron Road runs about 200 kilometres from Hanmer Springs to Seddon, with a maximum speed of 50 km/h, and takes at least six hours. Caravans, trailers, buses and vehicles over 7 metres are not allowed. The road closes for the season and reopens at Labour Weekend, and farm operations can use it until winter weather makes it impassable. Jacks Pass and Jollies Pass are alternative routes, though Jollies Pass is poorly maintained and needs four-wheel drive. A historic cob house no longer offers accommodation, but simple camping is available near the homestead and farmyards.

For more on cattle in remote country, see the ranching section on farm.FM and a farm.FM story about a New Zealand high country station. The Department of Conservation publishes a Molesworth visitor brochure.