Deer farm comes with tourism, hunting options

A Hawke’s Bay station, nurtured for over 100 years by the same family, is on the market for the first time.

Historic Te Rangi station, 50 minutes north of Napier airport, is generating strong interest among farming circles as far afield as the South Island.

Potential buyers recognise the opportunities a deer-fenced station of this scale offers.

The property, at 748 Heays Access Rd, Tutira, is offered for sale by tender closing November 20 by Bayleys Havelock North salespeople Tony Rasmussen and Gavin Franklin.

Potential tourism activities alongside farming include guided walks, 4WD and horse treks, mountain biking, hunting, wellness retreats, kiwi and other bird watching, as well as school camps and other educational activities to do with the geographical landscape and massive limestone bluffs on the property.

Franklin said the station’s summer safe country, with a good balance of easy-medium hill country, provides an opportunity for buyers to consider a range of land use opportunities.

Within the 560ha of pastoral country, Te Rangi has 460ha fenced for deer. There is also native bush rich in birdlife. A portion of the kanuka has grassy clearings and provides winter grazing for around 120 cows.

Latest soil tests indicate nutrient levels at or very near optimal levels, giving buyers confidence about its future stocking capacity. The station has a fantastic fertiliser history.

Te Rangi has been run as a finishing unit, taking advantage of good summer rainfall and the ability to winter weaner Friesian bulls on kale, selling as store before the second winter, along with bulls bred on the property and finished at 18 months, also before the second winter.

Much of Te Rangi’s finishing country is at the bottom and southern side of the farm, with reticulated water supplying all cultivatable areas.

There is the opportunity to increase Te Rangi’s stocking capacity through further cultivation and pasture renewal, while its 60 paddocks offer well-sized subdivision for the block.

Te Rangi’s history has been well recounted by Adrian Heays, grandson to the property’s pioneering founder Bob Heays, who settled the property after returning from Gallipoli in Wold War 1.

Earthquakes, depression, World War 11, and some boom-bust years have made Te Rangi a witness to almost New Zealand’s entire agricultural history. This includes the pioneering deer farming efforts of Adrian’s father Murray.

In true Kiwi fashion he took what was regarded as a noxious pest, acquired a licence and started to farm them.