Waikato is trucking steadily into a drought and Marlborough has seen one of its earliest picks for pinot noir bubbles.

On Country Life tonight, an old-time rabbiter shares stories of his life fighting the rabbit plague on Molesworth Station and Cosmo talks to Jamie Engelbrecht who quit his bank job to focus on hemp growing and processing - a business he started with some Lincoln mates a couple of years ago.

For the musterers at Molesworth Station, it's an early start to beat the heat. Josh, Duncan, Connell and Liam are moving the cattle during the mating season. Country Life spends a day with the stockmen, the farmer and the cook, peeling back some of the mystique of New Zealand's most famous farm.

A Raglan dairy farming family set up a wee milk bottling plant three years ago. They produced 30 litres of drinking milk a week and delivered it to local customers. Now they bottle and deliver 5000 litres - in one litre bottles - from the west coast to the east coast. Soon they'll stop supplying Fonterra altogether and may start looking to make cheese. They only have 150 cows but there are nine people on their payroll.

Over much of New Zealand pasture quality is dropping in the heat but stock are generally doing well. There are some sensational Hawkes Bay nectarines in shops.

The FMG Young Farmer of the Year competition is back says New Zealand Young Farmers CEO Lynda Coppersmith. The 2020 season was cancelled for the first time in the contest's 52 year history due to COVID-19 restrictions.

Country Life is out with musterers on horseback at Molesworth Station, New Zealand's largest farm and demand is soaring for milk from a small Raglan farm.

Bidding was competitive at the Mt Cass Station Wiltshire Sheep Sale in North Canterbury. Nearly 3500 sheep reached higher than expected prices at Andrew and Sara Heard's farm and were sold to bidders from Kerikeri to Cromwell. Wiltshires shed their wool annually and are becoming popular with farmers and lifestyle block owners seeking an easy-care meat breed.

Greg Taylor is the son of a bushman and first started working in forests in the 1960s. For more than 40 years he's lived near Colville in the northern Coromandel where he grows trees, fells and mills timber and makes one-off pieces of furniture.

People hunkering down in pandemic-hit US and UK - major markets for Marlborough wine - has meant a lift in sales of wine from New Zealand's largest wine growing region.