Mark Dillon Returns Home with Ploughing Tractor after European Competitions
Southland rural contractor and current NZ Ploughing champion Mark Dillon has got his tractor back after it enjoyed some extensive OE.
Ideal conditions greeted competitors at the 61st National Ploughing championships held near Rongotea in the Manawatu over the weekend.
The weather was fine and sunny and this helped attract good crowds for the two days of competition. There was a good representation from both the North and South Island for the event.
The chairman of World Ploughing, Colin Millar says the local organisers and the owner of the land where the competition was held really stepped up to the mark because it was beautiful site and well prepared land. The event was well run.
"The soil conditions were amazing, the level of the grass and the stubble was exceptional. We told the competitors they could remove as much straw as they like because there was no straw on the site," he says.
One of the events which attracted the crowds was the Rural News sponsored horse ploughing competition which saw six competitors in the race to win the coveted Rural News trophy. Sean Leslie and Kaye Walker from Middlemarch who took out the trophy.
Matt McRae, a farmer from Mokoreta in Southland who runs a sheep, beef and dairy support business alongside a sheep stud, has been elected to the Beef +Lamb NZ Board as a farmer director.
Ravensdown's next evolution in smart farming technology, HawkEye Pro, was awarded the Technology Section Award at the Southern Field Days Farm Innovation Awards in February 2026.
While mariners may recognise a “dog watch” as a two-hour shift on a ship, the Good Dog Work Watch is quite a different concept and the clever creation of Southland siblings Grace (9) and Archer Brown (7), both pupils at Riverton Primary School.
Philip and Lyneyre Hooper of the Hoopman Family Trust have tonight been named the Taranaki Regional Supreme Winners at the Ballance Farm Environment Awards.
We are not a bunch of sky cowboys. That was one of the key messages from the chairperson of the NZ Agricultural Aviation Association (NZAAA) Kent Weir, speaking at an education day at Feilding aerodrome for 25 policymakers and regulators from central and local government and other rural professionals.
New Zealand's dairy and beef industries say they welcome the announcement that the Government will invest $10.49 million in the Dairy Beef Opportunities (DBO) programme.