Country Life

Veteran New Zealand actor Sir Sam Neill takes Country Life on a tour of his Central Otago vineyard just before the 2023 season got underway.

From sinister bad guy to gentleman winegrower, it's all in a season's work for veteran New Zealand actor Sam Neill.

He returned to his Central Otago home from Brisbane earlier this month to find vines shooting up, his pet pigs waiting for a scratch and a young stand of native trees thriving on a ridge overlooking his Red Bank Vineyard.

Go for a stroll around Red Bank Vineyard with Sam Neill

"I was doing my day job. It was guns and getting shot and stuff like that," he said of his role in his latest film Bring Him to Me, being shot in Queensland.

"I love playing bad guys. They're really rewarding but here we are ... I'm back full-time with the wine again."

Red Bank is the headquarters for Neill's Two Paddocks label.

The 60-hectare property used to be a government research farm looking into crop suitability for the region.

There's still lavender, saffron, truffles and fruit trees alongside the vines, all organic.

A couple of hairy kunekune pigs, Angelica and Bryan and Peking ducks, also named after celebrities, add to the diversity.

Flowering was about a week away when Country Life visited.

"It's a scary, but scary in a nice way, time of the year.

"We're always sailing close to the wind. That's the thing about growing wine in a cold climate."

Neill's excited most by the farming side of wine but says he's obviously of most use when it comes to the marketing, although there's much less need for that now Two Paddocks is into its third decade.

With winemaker Dean Shaw, viticulturalist Mike Wing and the rest of his vineyard team, Neill is celebrating the 25th consecutive vintage of Two Paddocks Pinot Noir which he established in Gibbston Valley in 1993.

Friend and mentor James Mason introduced him to the grape variety during a trip to Charlie Chaplin's favourite restaurant in Switzerland in 1979.

"It was like nothing I'd ever tasted before.

"I asked him what it was and he said 'this is burgundy, my boy, and don't forget it'.

"The idea that I could grow my favourite wine in my favourite place was such a lovely idea I couldn't resist it."

Seventy-five-year-old Neill told Country Life he loves acting too much to go into retirement on the vineyard, even with a pair of snips in hand.

It would upset the balance he's found in life.

"One offsets the other, one kind of mitigates the other, one enhances the other," he said.

Go to this episode on rnz.co.nz for more details

Ian Knight has a passion for monarch butterflies. He used to farm them at his property in Hope, near Nelson, to be released at weddings all around the country. Now he just enjoys watching them hatch and grow.

Ian Knight has a passion for monarch butterflies. He used to farm them at his property in Hope, near Nelson, to be released at weddings all around the country.

He decided to give up the business when weddings were put on hold during the pandemic.

But he still enjoys watching the monarch's circle of life taking place not far from his back door.

"They're the the the largest and most decorative butterfly that we have in New Zealand," he told Country Life.

His family grew up with monarchs and swan plants which the creatures use to feed on.

"My youngest daughter was a marriage celebrant, and she came home from a wedding that she'd conducted one Saturday afternoon and she said, 'Hey Dad, I was at this wedding today and the couple released some monarch butterflies.'

"She said it was absolutely beautiful. It was the first time she'd experienced it.

"And so she naturally chatted to couple after the ceremony was over and we found out that they had searched right throughout New Zealand and that there was only one supplier up in Auckland for the whole of the country.

"I had recently retired at that point. And so she said, 'You've been a bit of an entrepreneur when we were kids, you always had swan plants around.' She said, 'All you'd have to do is to to grow some swan plants, put up a website on the internet and you can halve the monopoly that the guy in Auckland's got.'"

A few years later, his business was so successful he had the monopoly - nationwide.

Listen to the full chat with Ian Knight.

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Fonterra makes a record profit, the wine sector is trying to make use of its by-product, a far north strawberry grower has had to diversify their crops and it's mental health week - what's the message for farmers?

Fonterra makes a record profit, the wine sector is trying to make use of its by-product, a far north strawberry grower has had to diversify their crops and it's mental health week - what's the message for farmers?

Go to this episode on rnz.co.nz for more details

Which hemp cultivars grow best on a Karamea dairy farm? With the goal of helping to reduce carbon emissions, Jake Gibbons and Kathy Blumm are finding out.

Which hemp cultivars grow best on a Karamea dairy farm? Jake Gibbons is working towards finding out.

The former Antarctic explorer tells Country Life he's encouraging local farmers to use hemp as a way to reduce carbon emissions.

"There's been a lot of studies done that say one acre of hemp can sequester the same amount of carbon as one acre of Oregon pine.

"It takes Oregon pine 30 years to sequester that carbon. It takes hemp 120 days to do the same thing."

Gibbons believes switching to hemp will also help farmers improve the health and quality of the soil on rotational paddocks.

"It has the ability to pull out heavy metals and other bad aspects of soil that you don't want in there."

Listen to the story

Jake and his wife Kathy Blumm got their license to grow industrial hemp four years ago and own a 100-hectare native forest at Little Wanganui.

A cleared basin in the middle of it is where Jake plans to grow hemp to showcase to farmers.

In preparation, he's been gradually improving the soil fertility.

"Our soils are very acidic and thin, so I've tried to create the most diverse eco-system I possibly could."

Hundreds of plants are growing in a large tunnel house near the basin, and the best seed stock will be showcased to farmers.

Jake says there's already been a lot of interest, with several groups having already visited the site to check out his plants and discuss their potential.

"I'm kind of lucky. I'm a triple amputee so anytime I come up with an idea they love to come around to hear it because they think 'you're already mad' for a start!"

Before Jake and Kathy settled in Karamea, the couple worked for years with the US Antarctic Program at both the North and South Pole, which is where they met.

They also did several deployments to Greenland together, which is where Jake lost his two legs and an arm to frostbite.

"I got caught out in quite a large storm for three days and three nights, and somehow managed to make it back ."

This life-changing event led to the next stage, or adventure, in their lives.

"Kath and I had a talk and she said 'Well, what is something else you'd rather do?'

"And I said 'You know what, industrial hemp, that's going to be one of the key things in the future, it's something we can give back to society'. So we've put our hearts and souls on it'."

Go to this episode on rnz.co.nz for more details