He endured several kicks from cows and once had a narrow escape when the tractor he was driving "got away on him" and hurtled down a hill.
But Mr White will never forget an encounter with a sheep 10 years ago which almost cost him his right eye and left him with permanent eyesight problems.
It was about 5pm, and he was vaccinating the last of 1500 sheep on his farm at Toiro, west of Balclutha, using a hand-held gun which administered vaccine through a tiny needle.
He had just closed a gate when a sheep behind him decided to try to escape, "took me out in a late tackle", and knocked him to the ground.
The vaccination gun was flung from his hand, hit the ground and bounced, and the needle pierced the corner of his right eye.
Within hours, the contaminants on the needle had infected his eye, setting off a chain of events which resulted in four operations and permanent eye damage.
Mr White (60) said he was reminded of the accident every day.
Although he can still read, watch television and drive, and is learning to fly, the vision in his right eye is fuzzy and straight lines look crooked.
"I was pretty damn unlucky that the accident happened at all, but I was pretty damned lucky that I didn't lose my eye," he said at his Stirling home yesterday.
"I thank my [Dunedin Hospital] eye specialist, Rod Keillor, every time I see him."
After the accident, Mr White went home, cleaned his eye and got his daughter to inspect it.
It was not sore and felt normal, so he went to bed as usual. At 2am, he awoke in intense pain and felt a great pressure in his eye. He could not see out of it.
His doctor made a house call, contacted Dunedin Hospital, and by 4am Mr White was lying on the operating table having antibiotics injected into his eyeball.
He spent a week in hospital and was later told if he had arrived at hospital half an hour later surgeons would not have been able to save his eye.
His problems did not end there. Within the next year, he had to have an artificial lens inserted in the eye, and twice had to go to Christchurch to have a detached retina stapled back in place.
After an "extremely difficult battle" with ACC, he received compensation and was assessed as having a permanent disability.
Mr White retired from farming two years ago, but said it was because he wanted to do something different, not because of his eyesight.
While he always considered himself to be a careful and safety-conscious farmer, Mr White said the accident had changed his outlook.
"I was even more careful; not quite paranoid, but very much more aware. It's true that you don't appreciate what you've got until you almost don't have it any more."
