Senior Constable Paddy Henderson, who owned a shearing run before joining the police, said he was helping raise money for fellow shearer and friend Murray Kirk, who was recently diagnosed with a terminal brain tumour.
Snr Const Henderson used to have a shearing run and was a contractor for more than 15 years, before giving the run to Mr Kirk and enlisting in the police.
Mr Kirk had the shearing run until 15 months ago when he handed it over to Scotty Armstrong.
Mr Armstrong reached out to Snr Const Henderson asking for a hand and to help raise money for Mr Kirk and his family.
Snr Const Henderson and the shearing fraternity came up with the 24 hour shear-a-thon idea, with volunteer shearers and donated shearing contractor workers helping to reach the goal.
The profit raised from shearing the 8450 sheep would go to Mr Kirk, his wife and four children for one really good family holiday, something he was always too busy to do, Snr Const Henderson said.
"That’s for the Kirks to make memories with their family."
Members of the community would also turn up to help with the shearing, with some helping out in preparing meals or working the shed.
The shearing would begin at 7am today and the shearers would complete a normal eight-hour day before stopping for a break from 5pm to 6pm.
They would then do another eight-hour session, stopping around 2.30am.
After another hour break, the shearers would start their final push, through until 3pm tomorrow.
A core of shearers would be there for the whole time, with the remainder coming and going throughout three-hour stints.
A lot of coffee would be consumed, he joked.
Snr Const Henderson said he was confident he and his fellow shearers would be able to shear all of the sheep in the 24 hours.
