Country Calendar - Billy Riddell, Drover

This  Country Calendar episode profiles Billy Riddell, one of the few remaining drovers who was still moving herds the old fashioned way in the mid 1970s: “on the hoof” (the art of droving was being supplanted by rail and livestock trucks). The episode accompanies Riddell on a ‘drive’, as he moves a herd of cattle along the East Coast. Riddell’s narration recalls stampedes, river crossings, losing dogs and stock out to sea, the joys of butter, and why townies shouldn’t be on the roads: “the roads were there before cars were even blimmin' thought of”. He also reflects on a drover’s life.

You’ve got to know the good ones and the bad ones. And there’s not many bad ones, none; all good ones, good Māoris along here, the best. All good people along the road, around the coast anyway…

– Billy Riddell, on the people he meets en route