But that is not holding them back from working on their own account on the land they love.
The Upper Clutha men met three years ago while working on Grays Hills Station, a high country beef and sheep operation in the Mackenzie Basin.
They enjoyed their jobs there - Mr Willson was the stock manager and had a good position with many favourable perks, such as a home for himself, his wife Tui and their two pre-school children, while Mr Trevathan was a shepherd.
But they wanted something more.
Mr Willson, the son of Willy and Chris Willson of Queensberry, had been raised on a farm and briefly studied engineering at Otago Polytechnic before heading back to the great outdoors.
He has held several farm jobs throughout Canterbury and returned to live at Tarras last month.
"At the end of the day, while I enjoyed it, I wanted to be working for myself.
"My kids are 2 and 4 and I wanted to do it before they started school . . .
"I went to Grays Hills in 2003 and just loved it. It is quite isolated up there, which didn't worry me at all.
But it was just time for a change," Mr Willson said in a recent interview with the Otago Daily Times.
With meat and wool prices lagging behind dairy payouts, rocketing land valuations, and low wages in the rural sector, Mr Willson realised he had to look for new ways to earn a meaningful income to achieve his goals.
In March, he and Mr Trevathan became partners in Southern Lakes Livestock Services and purchased a purpose-built, two-stand mobile crutching trailer from Hecton Products in Invercargill for about $30,000.
The unit has a hydraulic lifting device for immobilising and turning sheep on their sides so the crutchers can cleanly remove wool without being kicked.
While similar units have been around the rural sector for between five and 10 years and several operate in Southland and South Canterbury, Southern Lakes Livestock Services' unit is believed to be the first in Central Otago.
"We saw them working at Grays Hills and knowing there was nothing here, we rang around a few people to work out if it was viable and if they would support it," Mr Trevathan said.
The seasonal nature of crutching should keep the fledgling business occupied for about 100 days a year between December and May and the men will look for contracts as fencers or musterers at other times.
"Going out contracting makes more money than full-time shepherding.
"But there are still 265 days of the year, potentially with nothing, if no-one gives us work anywhere else," Mr Trevathan said.
Mr Trevathan is the son of Beau and Ann Trevathan and was raised on a Tarras deer and beef farm.
He left school at the end of the sixth form to become a musterer in the Lindis Valley and at Omarama.
He is determined to make his own way in the rural sector and does not buy into the premise that because his parents are farmers, the farm will necessarily come down to the next generation.
Both men are sure about what they are doing.
They cannot imagine working in an office, or living in town, where aiming a gun at a rabbit might spark an armed offenders callout or hitting a golf ball could break a neighbour's windows.
They also share some optimism sheep farming will one day regain its ascendancy.
"There's a dairy boom at the moment and a lot of sheep and beef guys are a bit downhearted . . . but it will come back," Mr Willson said.