Katie's still leading by example

Katie Evans celebrating her 87th birthday with her colleagues at Aquarius Fisheries.

Katie (Aunty Katie) Evans celebrated her 87th birthday on Sunday. At that age she should really be retired, but she has no immediate plans to do that - and that makes her employer very happy.

David Olsen last week described his star employee at Aquarius Fisheries, at Paparore (north of Awanui), as an inspiration.

"Young people don't work like Katie does," he said. "She's amazing. She puts a lot of young people today to shame."

Katie (nee Erstich), born and bred at Paparore, said she couldn't remember when she started there, although it had to be more than 25 years ago.

When she started she had been shelling scallops, but these days spends her 7am to 3pm shift scooping the flesh out of oysters after the top shell has been removed.

She had taken inspiration from Mary Johnson, who she worked alongside for years, and who carried on into her late 70s, only calling it a day when a "crook" knee got the better of her.

She and her late schoolteacher husband Wayne had moved back to her childhood home from Twizel, and Katie now lives with her daughter, just off the Waipapakauri Straight.

That makes for a short commute to work, although until recently she had headed into Kaitaia to begin her day with a gym workout. And she's still got the energy to get stuck into her garden at the end of her working day.

She knocked off early on Friday, after receiving flowers and a cake (with just the one candle) from her workmates, but she was back on deck yesterday.