Philip and Alexander take care of the cropping operation and the day-to-day stock management. Catherine fits doing the books around her young family.
Philip snr's parents, Kipper and Esther Holt, were well-known for their love of planting native trees in the 1950s when other farmers were clearing them.
"In 1949 the farm was gorse, rushes and rabbits without a tree on it.
"I also had a very determined paternal grandmother who had a hard time in the 1920s and 30s keeping the farm going. Her name was Catherine Christobel de Vere Holt and she kept hold of the home block through drought, depression and earthquake."
When Philip took over the farm in the 1980s he too had to face drought, depressed commodity prices and the effects of Rogernomics when interest rates went above 20 per cent.
The farm has a low rainfall of 900mm and also no natural water supply. To ensure a summer supply to the stock the Holts have built more than 70 ponds and dams around the farm. The biggest is a nine-million litre dam measuring about 40 metres square.
There are also 150 gravity-fed troughs around the farm fed from hilltop tanks.
The need to reduce the demand for water in the summer is one more reason for planting trees as trees provide shade for stock.
The various exotic species other than pines have been planted for erosion control, leaf litter, colour and food for the birds and bees. Himalayan cedars, gleditsias, carobs are among the varieties planted.
There are also many single specimen trees planted simply because Philip likes them. Oaks and blossom trees stand out at certain times of the year.
"Beautiful trees take my mind off that mob of daggy ewes in front of me. I want to focus on the positive."
The variegated thistles have been sprayed by helicopter but the 23 power pylons running through the farm limit how much they can do. The boer goats are there to fill in. Philip's philosophy is for a more holistic way of weed and pest control without the need for repeated chemical spraying.
"There has to be a future in goat meat. More than half the world eats it."
The farm's eastern boundary is the Ahuriri Estuary. The Holts graze parts of the tidal flats to keep them tidy in flood times for the many varieties of wading birds living there. However, 48ha of the flats were the gift of the 1931 earthquake and remain extremely flood prone, especially at times when rain coincides with king tides.
The future for Maraetara is bright with the family continuing to be involved and much of the hard, infrastructural work done.