Women shaping the shearing industry in Australia

A New Path in the Shearing Shed

When Brittnee Bazeley left school to become a beauty therapist, she never expected to end up working in a shearing shed in regional New South Wales. But that’s exactly what she’s done for the last 15 years. Bazeley has worked her way up in the male-dominated sheep-shearing industry to become a wool classer and second-in-command at a station near Wagga Wagga.

Her shift from salons to shearing sheds began when she was a teen, after her mum sent her on a trans-Tasman journey. “I was just having a really tough time over here when I was 17, and my mum sent me over to New Zealand to find my dad,” she says. As it turns out, he was working as a shearer. “I just started out as a learner,” Bazeley says. “I stuck to his hip and watched him for a couple of days, and just went on from there.”

Now one of many women who serve as the backbone of the industry, Bazeley admits life in the shearing shed initially took some adjustment. “When I first started in the shearing, I actually used to get up and do my hair and makeup, and I’d look like a raccoon by lunchtime, so that didn’t last very long.”

Breaking Barriers in a Male-Dominated Industry

Shearing is an industry dominated by men, with 2021 Census data showing fewer than 5 per cent of the workforce are women. But some in the industry have reported an anecdotal rise in female participation since the COVID-19 lockdowns, when international shearers were kept out due to border closures.

One of those women is Nikki Lyons, a New South Wales shearer who set a world record for the most merino lambs shorn by a female in nine hours last October. She sheared 502 lambs between 6am and 6pm near Marnoo in Victoria’s Wimmera region, with nine of those hours spent shearing. Lyons has come a long way since shearing her first sheep with her mum’s dressmaking scissors, but she says it’s a lifestyle that has appealed to her since attending agriculture school.

“I like being physical,” Lyons says. “An office job was never for me. Before settling down and having kids, I loved the travel that shearing offered. It’s a job that can take you all around the world.”

The challenge and opportunity for self-improvement is what has her motivated to break records, but she also hopes to be a strong role model for her children. “My greatest wish is for my children to chase their dreams. They were a part of this journey with me, they heard the medicine ball slams at 4:30am, they saw me come home from work tired and sore, only to get back up the next day and do it all again,” she says.

“Shearing is a sport and an art. Regardless of how long you have been shearing, there is always something you can improve on and learn.”

While Lyons works to break barriers on the stand, there are plenty of women keeping the operation running behind the scenes. In Bazeley’s case, that’s wool classing, which involves sorting and grading the fleece into quality levels — a critical step in maximising the sale value of the wool. She’s also worked in the sheds as a rouseabout, tasked with keeping the floor clean, assisting shearers and ensuring production stays on schedule.

But ask any hungry shearer, and they’ll tell you it’s Jaz Taunoa’s job that’s among the most important: the cook. She works alongside Bazeley and holds the operation together by keeping stomachs full. “They get five meals a day,” she says. “I’m up at 4:30 every morning. It’s breakfast, smoko, lunch, afternoon smoko, dinner and dessert. It’s stressful. The shopping, oh my gosh, the shopping.”

A Home Away from Home

It’s fast-paced in the kitchen, but it’s where Taunoa feels most at home. “I used to rouseabout. I’m from Hawke’s Bay, New Zealand, and my mum had a run over there, so I was working with her up until 18,” she says. “I moved here about 20 years ago, and I did [rouseabout] for the first two years, but I’d rather cook. And it’s better money because I’ve got three young kids.”

It’s a lucrative industry, which Bazeley agrees is part of its appeal. “You’re able to travel, you make amazing money. You meet some really good people. This job takes you places a lot of jobs can’t,” she says. It’s also helped her connect to her heritage as a Māori woman. “Before, I knew a little bit about New Zealand. I didn’t know anything about the culture. I didn’t know what it meant to be Māori,” Bazeley says. “But in this industry, everybody and anybody is from New Zealand somehow, and knows somebody in New Zealand.”

Her son, Tama, has been welcomed in the sheds since he was a baby. “It’s a lifestyle that I love, and it’s something I’ve been able to build my family around.”