But, like most of Feilding, he really did not want to talk to the media and he headed off.
Feilding is small and tight-knit, nestled in the green rolling pastures of the Manawatu, the kind of place where stock trucks rumble by day and night. People either know the Guys or the Macdonalds, or both, and don't want to talk out of turn.
But some who knew Macdonald well did let slip how shocked they had been to hear him admit to the vandalism, arson and objectionable graffiti on the Guy farm.
They had no clue that was coming.
"You think you know someone," said more than one person.
Farming can be an isolated business but Macdonald had been a caring father to his four children and was on the board of trustees at their school at Colyton, a tiny hamlet just outside Feilding consisting of an Anglican church, the school and farms.
Mostly, Macdonald was described by people as "a plausible fellow", "a nice guy", "a friendly guy". He loved hunting. His dad, Kerry Macdonald, co-owns the hunting and fishing shop in nearby Palmerston North.
Ewen Macdonald went to Sunday School as a youngster and had seemed a normal country kid.
He met Anna Guy at what was then Feilding Agricultural High School (now just Feilding High School) and had gone to work on her family's farm, Byreburn, when he was 16.
He and Anna married at 20. Anna was the bubbly one in the relationship but people said they were good together. Anna was outgoing and she loved musicals.
Both families had raised their kids well - there were no signs of any of them going off the rails.
Macdonald just wanted to farm and he was bloody good at it, people said.
He had tended the barbecue at a fundraiser at Colyton School about a month before he was arrested, one man remarked.
They had talked for a bit with Macdonald saying the police investigation was going well, but as happens with farmers the talk quickly turned to cows and grass - how calving was going, how the grass was growing.
Macdonald had served a steak sandwich and had been chatty and pleasant.
"There would have been 100 people there that day and he would have made them all steak sandwiches."
He could work anywhere, he's that good a farmer, said one man.
He had entered the 2009/2010 regional farming awards, coming second overall and winning the merit award for farm management which is the "cows and grass side of farming".
Matthew Richards, chairman of the Dairy Industry Awards, said the awards meant he was doing a fantastic job on the farm.
"Obviously, he had a huge future ahead of him. He didn't get the top award but he had all the potential for a great career in farming."
Scott Guy had not entered the awards, as far as Mr Richards knew, but he understood Mr Guy was a good all-rounder and had his family's farming genes.
Mr Richards said the whole situation was so sad.
