Gardens and Wanaka’s green belt feathers in cap
GLEN Dene station farmer and former local body politician Lesley Burdon was a champion of the Upper Clutha farming community, a magnificent gardener and had very clear policies about protecting Wanaka’s green belt.
She died on April 14, aged 78, just five days after celebrating her 57th wedding anniversary with husband, Jerry Burdon.
Typically for the energetic, communityspirited woman, she was helping a close friend prepare food for vineyard harvest workers when she became unwell.
Lesley Noeline Atkinson was born in Christchurch on July 7, 1943.
Her parents were Jessie and John Atkinson and Lesley was the fourth of five children.
She attended Avonside Girls’ High School in Christchurch and studied nursing at Christchurch School of Nursing.
She was a young Christchurch city nurse when she met high country farmer and Lincoln College student Jerry Burdon at a party at the Sign of The Bellbird in the Cashmere Hills in 1962.
The pair instantly struck up a friendship and after marrying on April 9, 1965, they first lived at Mt Burke Station before moving to Glen Dene Station in 1979 to develop that farm.
She took to rural life like a duck to water and learned a whole new range of skills in selfsufficiency.
‘‘Lesley’s other great love, other than me, was her magnificent garden,’’ Mr
Burdon said at his wife’s funeral.
She created two gardens, one at the Glen Dene homestead, and the second at a new home nearby, enlisting the help of Lake Hawea locals to convert land covered in bracken fern and brown top into gracious gardens that featured on the Maggie Barry garden shows and in books and magazines.
Mrs Burdon’s mature gardens are now a sheltered, leafy 1.6ha paradise visited by people from all around the world.
‘‘Creating this garden enriched my life and developed my untapped creative skills,’’ Mrs Burdon wrote in a chapter devoted to gardening in Jerry Burdon’s family history book, Fine Wool and Brown Trout, published in 2020.
Her community service included election to the Wanaka Community Board, becoming the first female chairwoman from 199295, and to the
Queenstown Lakes District Council for two terms from 199298.
She also served Wanaka St John, the Vincent Hospital Board, the Otago Area Health Board and other health committees, while helping Mr Burdon develop their farm and raising three children Jo, Richard and Andrea.
Mr Burdon recalled in Fine Wool and Brown Trout that the move to the high country was ‘‘a totally new life for Lesley’’, who had completed her general nursing training in Christchurch and qualified as a New Zealand registered nurse in 1964.
‘‘The first big occasion not long after we’d returned from our honeymoon was when the neighbours all turned up for what was called a ‘‘tin canning’’. Albie Collins, who was the
Rabbit Board foreman, always went to such occasions and brought with him a little kitten, which he gave to Lesley. About 12 people turned up about 8am and the party lasted until midnight,’’ he said.
Mrs Burdon was undaunted by her introduction to rabbit board folk and later served the district’s Rabbit and Land Advisory Committee in 199596.
Mrs Burdon was remembered by her younger daughter, Andrea Donaldson, as the kind of woman who ‘‘started the day with a smile and finished it with Champagne’’.
She passed on her gardening knowledge to young people in the district, who had expressed gratitude for the experience later in life, Mrs Donaldson said.
Her older daughter, Jo Batchelor, said her mother ‘‘had a wonderful energy and vision for the land and made an amazing farming partner for Dad’’.
Son Richard Burdon recalled a mother who lived a full, positive life and was generous, happy and content.
His mother’s values were ‘‘firm as a rock’’ and she had a passion ‘‘to get the job done’’ on the board and council, he said.
‘‘Battle lines would be drawn and Mum would pour her heart and soul into getting good outcomes for this district,’’ he said.
RETIRED farmer and former councillor Neville Harris first met Mrs Burdon when she came to Mt Burke Station.
They remained great friends and teamed up together on many projects, including sitting on the district plan hearing panel under the Warren Cooperled council from 199598.
‘‘She was a great advocate for retaining the green belt around Wanaka, from Eely Point to Wanaka Station Park. A great debator and orator; she put her point across very well,’’ Mr Harris said.
‘‘We both worked on the district plan. We spent three days a week, virtually the whole time. There were 500 hearings we attended,’’ Mr Harris said.
He recalled Mrs Burdon was keen to align Wanaka and Lake Hawea with Cromwell and Alexandra in Central Otago and felt the local body reforms of 1989 erred putting Wanaka ward in the Queenstown district.
But despite losing the battle she did not make it a sore point, Mr Harris said.
Mrs Burdon’s other achievements for ratepayers included helping negotiate the purchase of the Wanaka Hotel and adjoining land for the council from former owner, the Skeggs Group.
Mr Harris said he and Mrs Burdon kept the transaction a secret because they did not want the price to rocket skywards if it became known the purchase was ultimately for the council, which eventually paid
$3.2 million for the property.
Not long after, the council sold the hotel into private ownership again, and with the benefit of hindsight, many regretted that, because it was on a prime site, he said.
However, ratepayers still benefited because the council kept the remainder of the property, which is now the site of the Lake Wanaka Centre — a controversial development in the late 1990s — and a new public library.
Although she stepped down from local government in 1998, she remained keenly interested in district developments, was a great supporter of Wanaka St John and helped facilitate the purchase of land for a new ambulance station in Link Way, Mr Harris said.
‘‘We were talking about the goings on, right up until the day she died,’’ he said.
‘‘She was a great person — always voiced her opinion, would sometimes take over a conversation if it was not going in the right direction. And she was great support for Jerry and her family,’’ Mr Harris said.
‘‘How she fitted in for a town person, becoming a country person, it was incredible. You’d think she was born and bred for it. She was all for the district. She had a great outlook,’’ he said.
Jerry Burdon’s father George Burdon had been farming merinos on Mt Burke Station since 1929.
Jerry and his brother, Cotty Burdon, split the station in two in 1979, creating Glen Dene Station.
Traditionally the property ran merino, sheep, deer and cattle and when Jerry and Lesley Burdon moved on to Glen Dene, the land was largely undeveloped.
They installed irrigation, fenced, planted trees, and controlled rabbits, ferrets and possums.
In 2000, the Glen Dene was chosen to present a Merino NZ promotion in Italy, resulting in Jerry and Lesley Burdon featuring on TVNZ’s longrunning farming show, Country Calendar.
In 2001, Richard Burdon and his wife, Sarah, became third generation owners of Glen
Dene Station, Jerry, Lesley, Richard and Sarah took the property through a sevenyear tenure review.
Richard and Sarah also added hunting and adventure tourism operations to the business mix and purchased the lease on the Lake Hawea Camp.
They diversified into cattle, deer farming and raising trophy stags.
Mrs Burdon is survived by husband Jerry, daughter
Joanne and soninlaw Dan Batchelor, son Richard and daughterinlaw Sarah Burdon, and daughter Andrea and soninlaw Nick Donaldson. She was a muchloved grandmother of Monty, Jamie, Archie, Georgie, Charlie, Ben, Abbie, and Wil.
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