Rabbits catch a ride out of floodwaters on a flock of sheep on a Taieri Plains farm.

Have you heard the one about the flood, the sheep and the rabbits? No?

In the midst of widespread flooding in Otago and Canterbury, a small colony of rabbits rode to safety on the back of a flock of sheep.

The rabbits hopped their way out of disaster onto the back of sheep on a Taieri Plains farm, west of Mosgiel.

Ferg Horne went to check on the sheep next to his Riccarton Rd West farm on Saturday morning as his neighbour was on holiday in Russia.

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"They were standing in the middle of the paddock on a high spot in about three inches of water," he said.

As Horne got closer, he thought the sheep must have been under water at some stage because they had debris on their backs.

"I got over there and it was rabbits."

Horne, 64, said he had never seen anything like it in his close to 50 years in farming.

"They must've jumped up onto their backs to get out of the flood. There was two on one sheep and one on another.

"They were as happy as can be those rabbits; they were warm and dry, snuggled up."

Before moving the livestock to safety, he quickly took a photo "because I didn't think anyone would believe me".

As the sheep began to move, the rabbits dug their claws into the sheeps' winter coats.

"Those rabbits, they weren't very good jockeys because they fell off halfway across," Horne said.

"There was a wee hedgerow there and I looked back and there they were climbing up into the trees."

Usually considered a pest, Horne said he spent all summer ridding his farm of the furry critters, "but I thought they showed so much initiative they deserved to live" in this case.

The water had since subsided from his and his neighbour's farm, he said. His neighbour returned from holiday on Monday "to all the fuss and floods".

"Further down the plain is a different story, but where we are we are good; we lost no stock, didn't even lose a rabbit."