SHEARING LAMBS

Press, Volume C, Issue 29681, 27 November 1961, Page 14

SHEARING LAMBS

Record Of 606 At Otorohanga (N.Z. Press Association) NEW PLYMOUTH, November 26. What began as a straightforward bet for an Otorohanga shearer, Mr C. Bosher, aged 29, concluded as a newworld lamb shearing record on an Awakino farm on Saturday. Setting out to teat a world record of 544 lambs shorn in a normal nine-hour day. Mr Bosher recorded a tally of 606. Working in the Waikawau Valley shed of his brother. Mr K. Bosher, Mr C. Bosher worked his way through the flock of Perendale lambs at a rate of one every 50 seconds, catching them all himself. Urged on by bets amounting to nearly £2OO, he turned in hourly run figures of 73, 67, 69, 67, 18, 66, 66, 67, and 62. His best efforts resulted in lambs neatly trimmed in 32 seconds. So fast was Mr Bosher that he almost worked himself out of lambs. He said later that he was aiming at 600 for the day. Fewer tl»an 610 lambs had been penned and it was almost a case of doing a smart round-up to provide more. Mr Bosher had little to say when asked how he felt at the end of his day. “My back has been hurting all day,” was his only comment. Mr Bosher first began regular shearing a few days before his 15th birthday. By the time he was 16 he was shearing more than 250 a day. He has a method entirely of his own, he says. “I do everything almost exactly the opposite way to Godfrey Bowen” (the present world title-holder at shearing ewes —559.)