Emily Welch is one of New Zealand's first and most successful female shearers, and one of the main focuses of an upcoming documentary looking at women shearers in New Zealand.
Emily Welch was one of the first competitive female shearers in New Zealand, and still holds a shearing world record Photo: Rebecca McMillan Photography
She Shears will premiere at the New Zealand International Film Festival. Check out details here.
For Bookmarks, she talks a bit about her life, the film, and to discuss her favourite music, books and movies.
She says she grew up on a farm in Kāretu, Northland.
"Very young we hung out with dad in the wool shed when he was shearing, and that's just, we were used to it, that's what you did.
When you got old enough to do the wool, you did the wool and then I got sick of doing the wool and the easiest way not to do the wool is 'can you teach me to shear'.
"I just got hooked on it. It wasn't at all what I planned to do, I got a university degree with a major in agriculture and I'd always intended to be a professional in agriculture, I have actually never gone down that path.
"I became a shearer and that's what I stuck at."
She says when she started there were not a lot of other women doing shearing.
"When we were growing up, dad had a shearing run, he had shearers who worked for him. And we did have a woman from Canada who came and worked for us, worked for dad, it was sort of a long family connection.
"So she was the first woman shearer I'd ever encountered and she was actually the first woman to win in a competition at the golden shears.
"You compete against the men, there's no women grade."
Emily's picks:
- Movies: August Rush, Hunt for the Wilderpeople, The Sound of Music
- Books: The Power of One - Bryce Courtenay
- Music: 'Ashes', Celine Dion; 'The Final Countdown', Leif Garrett; 'Wagon Wheel', Darius Rucker
