The amazing history of the Avoca studs

The Orpen family has been farming near Barkly East in the Eastern Cape since 1866. Gavin Isted looks at the history of the farm and the current production methods used for running the Avoca cattle and sheep studs.

- Gavin Isted

Geoff Orpen grew up on his father Mike’s farm Avoca near Barkly East. He embarked on full-time farming after the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2020. The farm has been in the Orpen family since 25 July 1866. Joseph Orpen, a famous surveyor from England, came to South Africa in 1854. As from 1862, he was responsible for surveying many farms in the Barkly East, New England and Lady Grey areas.

The Orpen family ran a well-known Arab horse stud on Avoca for many years. Mike’s grandfather (Geoff’s great-grandfather) Claude was responsible for bringing Arab Dordrecht horses to South Africa in 1911. He was also elected as the very first president of the National Wool Growers’ Association of South Africa. Fifty percent of the Orpen farm was sold in 1933 to pay off a bank overdraft of £20 000 (about R28 million today). In 2013, Geoff bought back Millerd, the section sold off in 1933, and the farm is thus back to its original size.

NATURAL PASTURES 

Avoca farm is 5 000ha in size, containing mixed mountainous grass veld of sweet and sour grasses, with the mountainous veld on the south-facing slopes being covered with unpalatable Elliot grass species such as wire grass (Elionurus muticus) and mountain wire grass (Merxmuellera disticha), and odd patches of turpentine grass (Cymbopogon spp). The northern slopes contain more palatable grasses, such as red grass (Themeda triandra), Setaria species such as small creeping foxtail (S. flabellata), and Eragrostis species such as weeping love grass (E. curvula