On his biggest day, WA shearer Shane Argent and a mate worked through eight hours to shear more than 800 sheep between them.
Now, the 49-year-old operates as a mobile, one-man shearing contractor under Britalia Shearing Services, moving between farms in the Wheatbelt, the Peel region and Perth Hills, where he really gets to see it all.
Mr Argent said he first took an interest in shearing as a kid on his family’s Pingaring farm watching shearers move through the shed with speed and precision.
“I thought they were the toughest, coolest people in the world,” he said.
“And I still do.”
Mr Argent first picked up the clippers in the 1990s, learning the craft at Narrogin Agricultural College before stepping into full-time shearing in 1998.
He is left-handed, something that made him something of an example at college, and Mr Argent said it took him 20 minutes to strip a belly right-handed and another 20 to complete the rest of the sheep.
“The instructors left me to it — iit showed them the college could teach anybody,” he said.
Mr Argent’s career then took him on many adventures beyond the shed.
His career highlights included shearing sheep on Phantom Of The Opera composer Andrew Lloyd Webber’s farm, shearing on Windsor Farm for Prince Edward and Princess Sophie, and working at events shearing in front of the likes of Madonna, meeting King Charles III at the Great Yorkshire Show and a chance encounter with then British prime minister Tony Blair on the day of his resignation.
Mr Argent said his shearing style was a mix of Australian fundamentals with a New Zealand influence, developed after working alongside Kiwi shearers.
He said his biggest strength as a shearer was keeping calm and staying disciplined.
“I’m relaxed with the animal, I shear what the sheep lets me. A calm shearer equals a calm sheep, and that equals a good job for everyone,” he said.
“You’ve got to be motivated and focused every day. You don’t get through it any other way.”
In 2013, Mr Argent stepped away from full-time shearing, closing his contracting run and working in other roles. But the break made him realise how much he missed it.
“I just wasn’t my full self,” he said.
“When a mate called me back to the shed in 2020, a fire just ignited again. I was back.”
Mr Argent now gets a lot of work through his social media page, where he posts photos from jobs across the regions.
His work ranges from shearing a few hundred sheep for an smaller operations, through to larger yardings where he occasionally brings in another independent shearer to share the load.
Mr Argent works across dozens of properties. He said he was still seeing farmers investing in their sheds and yards, even in challenging times.
But he has also witnessed the decline in sheep numbers in parts of the Wheatbelt, particularly through areas such as Kulin and Lake Grace, where some mixed farmers had shifted more heavily into cropping.
“When us contractors ring around for work, we’re hearing people say, ‘No, we’ve got out of sheep now’,” he said.
“OK, maybe I’ll give your brother a ring? ‘My brother’s also got out of sheep.’ Sometimes it’s like, ‘God, how many of them have got out of sheep?’”
Across a typical season in the Wheatbelt, Mr Argent averages 130 to 150 sheep a day, depending on the size and condition of the sheep.
He said this was a far cry from his peak years, but his own business allows him a better lifestyle outside work.
Now Rockingham-based, Mr Argent splits his time between family life and a wide mix of interests, from fishing and crabbing in Safety Bay, football (West Coast Eagles and West Perth Falcons), golf, darts, music, travel, and evenings spent at the Cruising Yacht Club in Rockingham or cooking a roast on the Weber.
After nearly 30 years on the job, Mr Argent still has the same enthusiasm he had when he started — and he says he has no immediate plans to put down the clippers.
“When you’re enjoying your work, I don’t think you can put an end date on it,” he said.
“It just keeps going.
“It’s provided me with stability, adventure and financial reward. But more than that, it’s the mateship and the satisfaction of seeing a well-shorn sheep run out the gate.”
