Melbourne Children’s Farm Sets World Record

Melbourne Children’s Farm Sets World Record

Media Release – For immediate release – 25 November 2013

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Shearer Brian Harker with the winning beanie

The sheep found at the Collingwood Children’s Farm (CCF) certainly are special. Last year one of them almost stole the major award at a regional agricultural show. Now they have helped to set a world record. As part of its “Celebrating Farming” event, the CCF recently entertained a large crowd who witnessed the successful transformation of wool from a sheep’s back into a finished beanie, all within half a day.

“We believe we have established a world record with this new format”, says Farm Manager Alex Walker, “the idea for this variation on the “Back to Back” format allowed visitors to spend a few hours at the Farm, and appreciate the connection between a living animal and an outcome of a finished garment”. On Sunday 25 November three teams competed, with The Flying Fingers Spinsters setting a benchmark time of 2 hours, 49 minutes and 35 seconds.

The world record for the international “Back to Back” format (where a freshly shorn fleece is knitted into a jumper within 24 hours) is currently held by the Australian Merriwa Jumbucks team. To allow for comparison with a beanie, their time for completing a full jumper is 4 hours, 51 minutes and 14 seconds.

“This event is a small part of our Celebrating Farming week”, informs Alex. “This family-focussed celebration marks the first local land sales in November 1838. Farming has occurred on this land continually since that time (175 years). In fact we understand squatters were farming the land on this site well before then”.

It is an incredible fluke of history that a city of 4 million people has at its heart a working farm, which to this day continues to feed, support and build community. And that its sheep are record breakers!

ENDS

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