Shrek the sheep became an international celebrity because he missed a haircut—for about six years. When the New Zealand merino was finally shorn in 2004, his fleece weighed roughly 27 kilograms.
His story began in the rugged country of Bendigo Station in Central Otago, where a sheep could be surprisingly hard to find.
The merino who avoided the muster
Te Ara, New Zealand's encyclopedia, records Shrek's six years of evading shearers and the enormous fleece that followed.
He had stayed out in the hill country, including shelter in a cave. His absence from the regular muster allowed a remarkable amount of wool to accumulate.
A shearing watched far beyond the farm
The shearing was broadcast on television. ABC's May 2004 report described the newly famous sheep later visiting New Zealand's parliament with owner John Perriam and members of the team who found him.
Shrek even met Prime Minister Helen Clark. What began as an unusual farm discovery had become a national story.
Merinos are usually shorn regularly. Shrek's extraordinary fleece made the result of a long absence visible in a way that was hard to overlook.
More than a woolly headline
Te Papa's account of its Shrek exhibition explains how his fame helped support fundraising, including for Cure Kids and Tarras School.
His appeal was easy to understand: an animal who had remained out of sight emerged with a coat so large that he barely matched people's idea of a sheep.
The portrait shows Shrek in 2008, rather than his 2004 discovery. The station photograph records an earlier chapter of the same landscape, in 1965.
Shrek's story lasted because it combined an unforgettable appearance with a real place, the people who found him and a second life in the public eye. Sometimes, a farm's missing sheep becomes a country's favorite character.
Photograph credits
- Photograph 1: John Abel, CC BY-SA 2.0. Resized; captions identify contextual images.
- Bendigo Station photograph: Archives New Zealand / CC BY-SA 2.0. Resized.
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