November 30, 2025 • 8 mins
The voice behind the FMG Young Farmer of the Year says the district finals are done and dusted as he looks forward to the regional and grand finals.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
He is a West Auckland hobby farmer. When he's not
doing that, he's a bit of a celebrity on the
speaking circuit, and he's also the voice of the FMG
Young Farmer contest. Andrew Lumston aka DA joins us on
the Country and Radar. All of the district finals are
done and dusted, we move into the regionals next year
(00:20):
February to April and minutes off to the Grand Final
July second to fourth in New Plymouth. Talk me through it.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Look at Tada Lucky final and it's interesting, you know,
I'm just looking down. What have we got. We've got
seven region seven eighths. I'm just looking at the name
of fifty six young people, any one of whom could
end up being the twenty twenty six APMG Young Farmer
of the Year. Quite a few names I'm seeing that
you know have been in there before. I'm just looking
at Northern You've got Karen mccahn and justin Ryegrock. You've
(00:51):
got I think kem clayton from Whybot might have been
in there before. And as you go down the list
all the way down to Oicago, Southland, I think Tom Slee,
maybe Cam Smith they've been in there before. You know,
there'll be others as well. Look, I've been doing it
for a while now, I've seen close to a thousand competitors,
I think, so look, I will have missed people out,
but it's nice to see those people that have been
(01:13):
there before coming back in, and it's nice to see
a whole crop of newcomers as well. So I think
we kick off Otago south from next because we generally
start where we ended and we'll go from there.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
I think of the recent young farmers that we have
on the show, So we've got Tim Dangan, Emma Paul,
George Dodson, Hugh Jackson, all outstanding young leaders in agriculture.
So you've got to be really smart to win this.
But then the onus is on you to lead the industry,
and you know these people certainly are.
Speaker 2 (01:44):
Yeah, look part of the competition. Now. There's been a
lot of conversation over the years, what does it mean
to be a farmer in the twenty twenties. You know,
you've not only got to have your skills on the
farm and your bookkeeping and your business skills and all
of that kind of thing is recognize that these people
go on to be leaders. So there is a component
of the competition for that. And also I think that
(02:06):
those people are naturally the kinds of people that do
well in this sort of thing. There will be winners,
you know, who win and then they head back to
the farm and do their things, and there are people
who haven't won that also become very good leaders from this.
But I think that's the nature of the competitors. And
you certainly, you know if you list that those four people,
they over the last of you know, what are the
(02:27):
last four or five years of winning, you know, they
standout individuals.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
Absolutely. Have they given up on the experiment of running
district and regional finals on the same day or same weekend, Yes,
they had.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
We had a crack at it for a couple of years.
There were certainly a lot of pros. There are certainly
a lot of cons. The conversation we've had, I guess
with the contest committee and they've gone back to having
those regionals, And you know, I like it in a
way because Young Farmers were set up as an organization
to bring people through, so you've got them being able
to organize a district before they head into the heady
(03:01):
world of organizing a regional and certainly before they go
into organizing a grand final. It just gives them a
chance to see what works and what doesn't work within
their own particular region. The other thing it does is
it gives it another day for people to get together,
you know, young farmers will set up to bring people,
you know, put people are basically in the same paddock,
in the same room, and this is just another chance
of doing it. Just a touch base with everybody, make
(03:23):
sure everybody's doing well. But I think still open for
what have we got. We've still got calls out for
the junior young farmer, so that's your high school kids
tends to in the agri kids. I think registrations are
still open for them as well. So there's another sway
of young people who'll be competing.
Speaker 1 (03:39):
Andrew Lumsden with us Teradar, the voice of the FMG
Young Farmer Contest. When I was watching the All Blacks
in Perth, my off side of Hamish McKay had a
yarn to you about your newly released book. It's called
Kiwi Country, Rural and Z and one hundred Objects. Now
is it beating the two books? On Jacinda on the
in the best seller because is it a good stocking
(04:02):
filler for Christmas.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
Look, it's the perfect stocking filler for Christmas. Actually we
designed it. We call it the ultimate toilet book. You
know a toilet book when you visit someone's house and
it's a great book and you read it on the toilet.
So it's been going great guns. I've sold a swag
myself at functions and things, and I'll tell you what
was nice. We got every one of the objects illustrated,
and I was at Parliament for a field days to me. Recently,
(04:24):
I gave it to Barbara Krueger and immediately people sit around.
They started pointing at various objects on the cover, and
they started telling their stories about things. So it's a
really nice one. And I'll tell you what. If you
want to be that person that can bore people with
an it goo de tales of rural things the day
after Christmas, it's the book for you.
Speaker 1 (04:42):
I love boring people. I do it for a living radar.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
Look, I'll tell you what. Next time you've got someone
on you'll be able to think, oh wait too, I
know a story about that. You'll be able to go
to the book. We're actually young farmers are in there
and through the medium of my of Muldoon's lamb, which
I'm steering it right now on my bookshelf, the lamb
given to Robert Muldoon by the Young Farmer's Club back
in this in nineteen seventy six. It was in christ
Shirt when it was the scaur up Young Farmer of
(05:06):
the Year. Laid my hands on that, and that's the
object that sort of explains that whole concept of young
farmers and aspirations. A guy that was organized. I wanted
Prince Charles to do it, and now he said, look,
we will ever know if you can do it if
we don't ask. And that's the kind of attitude that
has got farming where it is today.
Speaker 1 (05:22):
It could have been worse. They could have asked Prince
Andrew could yeah, and that wouldn't have gone down well,
that story wouldn't have ended.
Speaker 2 (05:28):
Well, would have had to sanitize my lamb.
Speaker 1 (05:32):
Well, he's full time making a lamb chop of himself
talking about lamb chops. I know you're a west Auckland
hobby farmer ten because no doubt you run a few yees,
have a few lambs. You know, we lamb on the
Christmas dinner table. Is that how it works, Radar.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
I do look across the field at my neighbor's lambs,
but currently I'm grazing two shire horses and a knocked
out Thoroughbred that a young woman owns, and they're not
great for the pasture and they's certainly not great for
my fences. So I'm in the midst of doing that
thing that the hobby farmers do when they need to
do some fencing is buying all the equipment. Often, you know,
and you're trying. You don't want to get the expensive
(06:11):
stuff because you don't need it, but you don't want
to get the cheap stuff because it's going to fall apart.
So I'm in that zone at the moment. And then
I've got about eight hundred meters of fencing to do
over the next couple of weeks. And I've got my
posthole borer, which I've had for a while. I've dig
some holes in the clay, because again it's a seasonal thing.
If it's too wet in the white tarket e Is,
you can't dig up a hole in the mud, and
if it's too dry, you don't get your post.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
I bor it in Have you got a spinning Jenny.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
I have got a spinning Jenny. It's about to be
delivered today. I got one with a little bit of
a break on it. And we'll see what one hundred
dollars buys in the world of spinning Jenny's.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
You know that canender in a couple of weeks. You
know that canand and tears if you walk out too
quickly without the break on your spinning Jenny.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
Oh look, there's a lot of things I'm going to learn.
And I tell you what, when we go into next
year for Young Farmer, and when I'm down at Mystery
Creek the field does and I'm watching all those the
fencing competition down there, I'm going to have an entirely.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
New respect for them.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
But here's the great thing. We live in a world
now where if you don't have that ability to know
a thing, you can go online and you can look
on YouTube. And we've got some very good practitioners of
things like piencing. And I'll tell you what their little
lessons on your terminal knots and straining wire and all
of that brilliant How I translate that from the screen
to the paddock again, we'll have a conversation a little while.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
I'll let you know, well, you need to get a
lesson from some of those guys down at field days
or the rural games. They're brilliant, brilliant fences. Okay, I
got to go. I might have mixed my metaphors with
Prince Andrew and the lamb chop. I think pork chop
is what I was looking for.
Speaker 2 (07:33):
Wasn't Look, he's in the awful pit, regardless of what
Cutty is actually the awful.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
Prete Yeah, okay, the book, all right. The book is
called Kiwi Country, Rural New Zealand and one hundred objects,
a great toilet book, ideal stocking filler. And you could
not just send her off the best sellers list. And
that's her own book and the unauthorized biography with the.
Speaker 2 (07:56):
Support of all those good rural folks and not so
rural folks, we certainly keep.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
And you've got on your radar image marketing your book
as a toilet book.
He is a West Auckland hobby farmer. When he's not
doing that, he's a bit of a celebrity on the
speaking circuit, and he's also the voice of the FMG
Young Farmer contest. Andrew Lumston aka DA joins us on
the Country and Radar. All of the district finals are
done and dusted, we move into the regionals next year
(00:20):
February to April and minutes off to the Grand Final
July second to fourth in New Plymouth. Talk me through it.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Look at Tada Lucky final and it's interesting, you know,
I'm just looking down. What have we got. We've got
seven region seven eighths. I'm just looking at the name
of fifty six young people, any one of whom could
end up being the twenty twenty six APMG Young Farmer
of the Year. Quite a few names I'm seeing that
you know have been in there before. I'm just looking
at Northern You've got Karen mccahn and justin Ryegrock. You've
(00:51):
got I think kem clayton from Whybot might have been
in there before. And as you go down the list
all the way down to Oicago, Southland, I think Tom Slee,
maybe Cam Smith they've been in there before. You know,
there'll be others as well. Look, I've been doing it
for a while now, I've seen close to a thousand competitors,
I think, so look, I will have missed people out,
but it's nice to see those people that have been
(01:13):
there before coming back in, and it's nice to see
a whole crop of newcomers as well. So I think
we kick off Otago south from next because we generally
start where we ended and we'll go from there.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
I think of the recent young farmers that we have
on the show, So we've got Tim Dangan, Emma Paul,
George Dodson, Hugh Jackson, all outstanding young leaders in agriculture.
So you've got to be really smart to win this.
But then the onus is on you to lead the industry,
and you know these people certainly are.
Speaker 2 (01:44):
Yeah, look part of the competition. Now. There's been a
lot of conversation over the years, what does it mean
to be a farmer in the twenty twenties. You know,
you've not only got to have your skills on the
farm and your bookkeeping and your business skills and all
of that kind of thing is recognize that these people
go on to be leaders. So there is a component
of the competition for that. And also I think that
(02:06):
those people are naturally the kinds of people that do
well in this sort of thing. There will be winners,
you know, who win and then they head back to
the farm and do their things, and there are people
who haven't won that also become very good leaders from this.
But I think that's the nature of the competitors. And
you certainly, you know if you list that those four people,
they over the last of you know, what are the
(02:27):
last four or five years of winning, you know, they
standout individuals.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
Absolutely. Have they given up on the experiment of running
district and regional finals on the same day or same weekend, Yes,
they had.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
We had a crack at it for a couple of years.
There were certainly a lot of pros. There are certainly
a lot of cons. The conversation we've had, I guess
with the contest committee and they've gone back to having
those regionals, And you know, I like it in a
way because Young Farmers were set up as an organization
to bring people through, so you've got them being able
to organize a district before they head into the heady
(03:01):
world of organizing a regional and certainly before they go
into organizing a grand final. It just gives them a
chance to see what works and what doesn't work within
their own particular region. The other thing it does is
it gives it another day for people to get together,
you know, young farmers will set up to bring people,
you know, put people are basically in the same paddock,
in the same room, and this is just another chance
of doing it. Just a touch base with everybody, make
(03:23):
sure everybody's doing well. But I think still open for
what have we got. We've still got calls out for
the junior young farmer, so that's your high school kids
tends to in the agri kids. I think registrations are
still open for them as well. So there's another sway
of young people who'll be competing.
Speaker 1 (03:39):
Andrew Lumsden with us Teradar, the voice of the FMG
Young Farmer Contest. When I was watching the All Blacks
in Perth, my off side of Hamish McKay had a
yarn to you about your newly released book. It's called
Kiwi Country, Rural and Z and one hundred Objects. Now
is it beating the two books? On Jacinda on the
in the best seller because is it a good stocking
(04:02):
filler for Christmas.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
Look, it's the perfect stocking filler for Christmas. Actually we
designed it. We call it the ultimate toilet book. You
know a toilet book when you visit someone's house and
it's a great book and you read it on the toilet.
So it's been going great guns. I've sold a swag
myself at functions and things, and I'll tell you what
was nice. We got every one of the objects illustrated,
and I was at Parliament for a field days to me. Recently,
(04:24):
I gave it to Barbara Krueger and immediately people sit around.
They started pointing at various objects on the cover, and
they started telling their stories about things. So it's a
really nice one. And I'll tell you what. If you
want to be that person that can bore people with
an it goo de tales of rural things the day
after Christmas, it's the book for you.
Speaker 1 (04:42):
I love boring people. I do it for a living radar.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
Look, I'll tell you what. Next time you've got someone
on you'll be able to think, oh wait too, I
know a story about that. You'll be able to go
to the book. We're actually young farmers are in there
and through the medium of my of Muldoon's lamb, which
I'm steering it right now on my bookshelf, the lamb
given to Robert Muldoon by the Young Farmer's Club back
in this in nineteen seventy six. It was in christ
Shirt when it was the scaur up Young Farmer of
(05:06):
the Year. Laid my hands on that, and that's the
object that sort of explains that whole concept of young
farmers and aspirations. A guy that was organized. I wanted
Prince Charles to do it, and now he said, look,
we will ever know if you can do it if
we don't ask. And that's the kind of attitude that
has got farming where it is today.
Speaker 1 (05:22):
It could have been worse. They could have asked Prince
Andrew could yeah, and that wouldn't have gone down well,
that story wouldn't have ended.
Speaker 2 (05:28):
Well, would have had to sanitize my lamb.
Speaker 1 (05:32):
Well, he's full time making a lamb chop of himself
talking about lamb chops. I know you're a west Auckland
hobby farmer ten because no doubt you run a few yees,
have a few lambs. You know, we lamb on the
Christmas dinner table. Is that how it works, Radar.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
I do look across the field at my neighbor's lambs,
but currently I'm grazing two shire horses and a knocked
out Thoroughbred that a young woman owns, and they're not
great for the pasture and they's certainly not great for
my fences. So I'm in the midst of doing that
thing that the hobby farmers do when they need to
do some fencing is buying all the equipment. Often, you know,
and you're trying. You don't want to get the expensive
(06:11):
stuff because you don't need it, but you don't want
to get the cheap stuff because it's going to fall apart.
So I'm in that zone at the moment. And then
I've got about eight hundred meters of fencing to do
over the next couple of weeks. And I've got my
posthole borer, which I've had for a while. I've dig
some holes in the clay, because again it's a seasonal thing.
If it's too wet in the white tarket e Is,
you can't dig up a hole in the mud, and
if it's too dry, you don't get your post.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
I bor it in Have you got a spinning Jenny.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
I have got a spinning Jenny. It's about to be
delivered today. I got one with a little bit of
a break on it. And we'll see what one hundred
dollars buys in the world of spinning Jenny's.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
You know that canender in a couple of weeks. You
know that canand and tears if you walk out too
quickly without the break on your spinning Jenny.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
Oh look, there's a lot of things I'm going to learn.
And I tell you what, when we go into next
year for Young Farmer, and when I'm down at Mystery
Creek the field does and I'm watching all those the
fencing competition down there, I'm going to have an entirely.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
New respect for them.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
But here's the great thing. We live in a world
now where if you don't have that ability to know
a thing, you can go online and you can look
on YouTube. And we've got some very good practitioners of
things like piencing. And I'll tell you what their little
lessons on your terminal knots and straining wire and all
of that brilliant How I translate that from the screen
to the paddock again, we'll have a conversation a little while.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
I'll let you know, well, you need to get a
lesson from some of those guys down at field days
or the rural games. They're brilliant, brilliant fences. Okay, I
got to go. I might have mixed my metaphors with
Prince Andrew and the lamb chop. I think pork chop
is what I was looking for.
Speaker 2 (07:33):
Wasn't Look, he's in the awful pit, regardless of what
Cutty is actually the awful.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
Prete Yeah, okay, the book, all right. The book is
called Kiwi Country, Rural New Zealand and one hundred objects,
a great toilet book, ideal stocking filler. And you could
not just send her off the best sellers list. And
that's her own book and the unauthorized biography with the.
Speaker 2 (07:56):
Support of all those good rural folks and not so
rural folks, we certainly keep.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
And you've got on your radar image marketing your book
as a toilet book.
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