DROVER’S STORY OF RECORD TREK

Otaki Mail, 25 January 1943, Page 1

DROVER’S STORY OF RECORD TREK

(By Arch Speirs in “Sydney Sun.”) The biggest bit of droving in Australian cattle, history has just ended. The bombing of Wyndham meat works and the threat of invasion early in last year led to the decision to evacuate the bulk of the herds in the northwest—some soutli to Perth, but the big majority to the Queensland railheads to be shipped eastward to the processing plants at Bowen, Townsville, Mackay, Rockhampton and Brisbane.

! Arch Speirs, of Melbourne, well | known horseman at Victorian shows, : was second in charge of ono of the mobs which left tho Orde River at the end of April and arrived at Dajarra in Western Queensland on November 23, and in this story lie gives an intimate picture of life on the trail. When I heard of tlie Great Trek, I determined to be in it. I set out for Newcastle Waters, which, at the end of the “wet,” becomes droving headI quarters. There the drovers assemble, rest up, and get new supplies before going out to Victoria River, Wave Hill, and Ordo River, the biggest cattle range in the world. I joined up with a team which started from Lissadell in the Kimbcrleys between Argyll and tlie Ordo River, with a contract to take 1350 head of cattle to Dajarra railhead. The outfit consisted of the boss drover, myself as second in charge, four white stockmen and throo aborigines. The boss drovor is the king of the outfit. He lias complete charge. Our man was Tom Lewis, a nop lie w of Bobby Lewis, the famous jockey. Tall, spare, a typical cattleman, be is recognised as one of the greatest cattlemen in tho country. He was born in a cattle camp, has lived most of his life in tho saddle and cattle camps, and has never even been in Brisbane. Wo had a good outfit. Lewis saw to that. There were 82 horses for tlie nine men. Of tlicce two teams of eight were for the- chuck waggon. The stockmen had tlireo or four horses each, and there were nine night horses. These night horses are the most highly educated of the string, and con sequently the most valuable. They are nover used for anything but night work, and on therm to a great extent depends the success of any droving venture. The cattle are mustered at the I station by the regular station hands. I When the boss drover takes over lie goes over them carefully using his light to cast out any which lie thinks will not travel tho distance. His contract holds him down to an average rate of travel of 56 miles a week and a reasonable distance per day. He agrees to provide the men (at least four to each mob), plant, horses and lations, and the rate of pay is 2s per head per 100 miles, or £8 a day if there is a hold-up through floods, disease or inoculation. The station stockmen accompany the mob the first day. The education of the cattle to roal travelling then begins. They must, be handled properly and broken in to regular hours. All watches and clocks, irrespective of eastern stanard or daylight saving or any other lime are set at sundown to 6 o’clock. This is known as road time, and is not altered throughout the drive. The bullocks are drafted on to their camp by sundown. The station stockmen then leave, and the bullocks arc then in the hands of the boss drover. By the time the cattle are bedded the ho'rse tailer who has been holding the horses a mile or two away on good feed, brings in the night iiorses. The cook calls “Come and get ;t.” It is supper that lid serves—not ea or dinner —supper. The aborigines ire served first, and they then go to their own camp -fire, 20 yards away. . It is a lonely job riding round the herd. The main purpose is to keep the cattle lying down, sleeping peacefully. ,'his is done by singing or whistling softly or crooning, and in our camp we covered everything from swing to grand opera, without tho effects. The aborigines sing their corroboree songs usually—a tuneless sort of chant, but strangely ibeautiful some of them. I have listened to them for hours. One of our black boys had three different voices, and lie could make you think three different men were with you. Often the cattle will “jump”—some ot them will leap to their feet and start moving into the centre, scared by the crack of a twig or at nothing at all. Occasionally the “jump” develops into a stampede. We had one'. We were camped on a plain in gidgee country. The cattle broke during tlie 3 a.m. watch—the last dog watch. We had no idea what had started it. They went oway from* the camp, luckily, in the direction in which we were travelling. At 4 a.m. the whole of the camp is awakened swags are roiled in regulation 3tyle, and breakfast is ready. The moment the day horses arrive the stockmen catch their mounts and saddle up. Then the stockmen fill their water bags, cut their own lunch, and stow it away in their saddle bags along with a ration of sugar and tea. By this time it is “piccaninny daylight”—the first streaks of the false dawn (remember, it is road time) —and the whole camp is ready to move. The cattle are wakened gently by soft-voiced talking and calling, only in unusual circumstances by the cracking of whips. The lead man, wing men and the tailers take their places and the bullocks drop into their travelling formation. Then comes their feeding time. They are worked into a fan formation covering a faci of perhaps a mile and feed as they go. Ater a couple of hours they are brought back to the travelling order and the pace improves. Some Jays we covered only four miles, but the contracts usually provided that herds may not average more than 65 miles a week. At 10 a.m. we made dinner camp. The herd is stopped and the men take up posts round the bullocks. Then they dismount, light a fire and boil their ciuart pot 3 to make tea—usually two to a fire, but the whites never use the black man’s. The meal consisted of bread, cold beef and a slice of brownie. Two hours’ rest and on again. Then the boss driver leaves the herd to the second in charge and goes on ahead to pick a site for the night’s camp. With him go the cook with the chuck waggon and tho horse tailer with his mob. By the time the herd arrives everything is Toady. That was the story of our bit of droving—day after day, week

after week. Apart from the stampede the only incident was when we lost our rifle. We shot a bullock every eight or nine days for tucker, and when we lost the rifle we had to use other means. The method I used was to puli them over by the tail, jump off the horse, hold the beast’s head, “pith” him' (sever tho spinal cord) just behind the horns with a knife, and thex- cut the jugular vein. Another method is to chase the bullock until he begins to lire. You jump off the horse, which runs to tho offside of the bullock. Aou run up on the near side, catch his near foreleg with your right and throw him. Catch a man on the wrong foot at football and the slightest push will floor him. So it is with the bullock—but you must not miss. These ways of pulling them down surprised some American stockmen we saw up there. They were also surprised at the length of our drive and size of our mobs, and the way we handled them'. We left the Ordo at the end of April and we arrived at Dajarra, 1400 miles away, on November 23. The season was lute — it should have been over by the end of September —and the last part of the drive was tough; Some of these late mobs, all starting with 1350 cattle lost heavily. One finished with 600 and another with 400, and one lost the lot. I wouldn’t have missed it. I had the satisfaction of being in the biggest cattle drive in Australia, for I was told —and I believe it—that 85,000 cattle crossed the Queensland border from the west during those weeks.