$20,000 fine after 1400 sheep starved

Leaving 1400 sheep to starve has cost a PGG Wrightson livestock manager and auctioneer more than $20,000.

Neville William Clark, 46, on Monday pleaded guilty to leaving the sheep on a 412ha forest block just south of Gisborne.

Today, in Gisborne District Court, he was fined $11,000 and ordered to pay $9700 in vet and investigations costs.

Judge Tony Adeane said Clark was a first-time offender, and there was no suggestion he was "wilfully cruel for the sake of cruelty. Rather he has fallen short of good [farming] standards".

But Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry (MAF) Jockey Jensen said Clark had made a conscious decision to place large numbers of vulnerable sheep into an entirely unsuitable area.

"This isn't a case of a farmer caught out by a seasonal event like drought," Mr Jensen said after today's sentencing.

"The standard of care in this case was well below and far removed from what the majority of reasonable and prudent farmers would do.

"This conduct impacts on the reputations of the majority of farmers in New Zealand, who are good farmers that take the welfare of their animals seriously."

Clark took out the grazing lease on a plantation block of pine trees south of Gisborne in March 2008, purchasing and stocking it with about 1500 sheep.

A few months later, an investigation was carried out by MAF after an initial inspection by the local SPCA on part of the block revealed numerous dead and poor condition sheep.

Mr Jensen said an initial assessment of the property revealed a large number of dead sheep in various stages of decay, live sheep in very poor condition and some so weak and emaciated that they were unable to stand.

Pasture of any quality was non-existent and a fuller inspection the next day found sheep needing to be euthanased.

Clark said he knew there were dead sheep on the property but maintained they had all died from facial eczema. He did not seek a veterinary diagnosis at any stage to confirm his suspicions.

Mr Jensen said a muster was organised, with the help of local farmers, to remove all the surviving sheep from the plantation.

A number were euthanased and surviving sheep were found to be emaciated. Autopsies found signs consistent with severe and prolonged malnutrition and parasite infections, not facial eczema.

MAF issued instructions that any sheep remaining on the property after the muster had to be removed onto good feed within 14 days or put down if they could not be removed. This instruction was not followed, and Clark's explanation was that "it was too wet".

Just over 700 of the original sheep that had been placed in the forestry block were found alive, leaving more than half dead or unaccounted for. Clark provided no explanation for the missing sheep.

- NZPA