The Lowrys at Okawa
My name is Tom Lowry. My wife Sal and I along with our three children, Rosa 9, Lily 6 and Tom-tom 2, live at Okawa situated 17 km from Hastings.
Our Children are the sixth generation of Lowrys on this property. My father Tom Senior is still living on the farm as well, so we are privileged to have three generations on the property – three generations of Toms!!!
Our older two children Rosa and Lily attend the local primary school, while Tom-tom stays at home and helps out with the pet lambs, pet horse and a goldfish. We enjoy the outdoors and can often be found during the summer months having fun and entertaining on the Tutaekuri River which runs through the back of Ngamahanga.
During winter we are attempting to become a skiing family – which is a whole lot of fun.
Our family loves the farm and its way of life. Okawa has been kind to the previous generations and our aim is to continue this into the future.
Okawa
Okawa is a summer dry 1700 hectare Sheep and Beef farm that has been in our family since 1852. We are the fifth generation farming this land. Okawa comprises three properties (Okawa, Ohiwia and Ngamahanga) and is run as one.
In our sheep operation we currently mate 3000 ewes and 1000 hoggets that start lambing in June, and produce 5000 lambs. We also winter trade lambs.
Alongside our sheep operation we have 400 south devon and angus cows. We fatten their progeny. We also fatten 2 yr old steers and bulls, and graze dairy cows.
We specialise in growing red clover crops and mixed swards of chicory and clover. Our soils are silt loam with limestone rock and all paddocks have reticulated water.
We thoroughly enjoy our farming operation and pride ourselves on delivering to you top quality lamb.