Fernhill - From DOC to dairy on the family farm

Fifth generation dairy farmer Jason Christensen took a break from the family farm to try life as a DOC ranger. His experience in the world of conservation, evident on the Mt Bruce farm in the foothills of the Tararuas, saw him awarded two of this year's Greater Wellington Ballance Farm Environment Awards.Jason Christensen overlooking recent plantings on the farm.You can trace much of the Christensen family's 144-year-old farming history through the items on display at the Mount Bruce Pioneer Museum located in the heart of their dairy property.It started with milking machines, which dairy farmer Henry Christensen started collecting in the 1980s. Among other items like washing machines, a telephone exchange, old record player, and commercial butter-maker, the machines would go on to form the backbone of the museum in 1986.It took him over 50 years to bring together the collection, thought to number in the tens of thousands.It's grown over the years, with Henry being gifted items from estate sales or purchasing them off other local collectors."It keeps going alright," Henry told Country Life on a tour of the museum."Some of the oldest items would be over 100 years old."An interactive pedal milking station at the Mount Bruce Pioneer Museum.Not afraid to leave his own mark on history, Henry was also an early adopter of new technology such as the rotary shed and he built the first in Wairarapa.Told it wouldn't last more than a month, 50 years later it's still used for milking - though the deck is admittedly "pretty thin in some places".That pioneering spirit lives on in Henry's son Jason, who now runs the family farm which was first purchased in1879. Jason is the fifth-generation in charge."Yeah it's pretty special," Jason told Country Life. "It was one of those earlier blocks that was divvied up in the 1800s. We've stayed here ever since."Fernhill's rotary milking shed was one of the first to be built in Wairarapa.Fernhill, a 562-hectare farm nestled in the foothills of the Tararua Range, runs just under 300 Jersey cows for milking.Before taking on the farm, Jason spent over a decade working as a ranger for the Department of Conservation, primarily on Mana Island off the Kāpiti Coast and later out of Waikanae."Everyday was different, it's a bit like farming. One day you could be greeting visitors, the next day you could be head down, bum up doing a whole lot of maintenance."As the job changed to become more "officebound" and Henry started thinking about retiring, Jason made a return to the family farm…Go to this episode on rnz.co.nz for more details