It’s Lambing Season in New Zealand. The Paddocks Are Chaos. I Love It.

I wrote this in 2016 or 2017 during the two years I lived in New Zealand. Some details — prices, hours, what’s open — may have changed, but the experience and my love for this place haven’t.

I mentioned a month or so ago that we were seeing a lot of pregnant sheep as lambing season approached. And now the time is here! Driving around New Zealand this time of year is a treat — the paddocks are full of lambs of various shapes and sizes, some lazing about on the grass and others chasing each other around in circles.

You see lots of twins everywhere, and just about every ewe has a lamb close by. Farmers who have ewes carrying twins or triplets give them preferential feeding — so those well-fed mamas produce a lot of well-fed babies. If you stop to listen you can hear them calling to each other across the paddocks. It gets surprisingly loud with all that bleating.

The numbers are staggering when you think about it. In June 2015, New Zealand had about 4.6 million people and 29.5 million sheep — roughly six sheep per person. Millions of sheep means literally millions of lambs every spring. Many of them will eventually be sold for meat, and lamb is a very popular menu item here for obvious reasons. But for now, I think even the farmers enjoy watching their energy and antics.

Most lambs have their tails removed — called docking — at around three weeks of age. Each lamb is vaccinated, drenched, ear-marked, and then has its tail docked with a sharp knife, searing iron, or rubber ring. It sounds harsh but it’s standard practice — the rump is then sprayed with a chemical to prevent fly strike, which is flies laying eggs on a living animal. Left untreated, fly strike can kill a sheep, so docking is genuinely a welfare measure, not just a farming convenience.

You won’t find lamb tails in the stores, but they are a seasonal delicacy — particularly in Māori communities. My partner’s nephew posted on Facebook a few weeks ago about how “yummy” they are. During docking season it’s common to give the tails to the dockers, who cook them up as a special treat over an open fire. There’s a great blog about how they do it here. Our nephew says it’s an acquired taste. I’ll take his word for it.