More regions to face drought declarations
Rural Communities Minister Mark Patterson says the present weather conditions remain challenging for farmers.
Gary Davis, Horowhenua, hasn’t seen a season like this before in the district. It’s been unusually wet for this time of the year and while the actual amount of rain that’s fallen is not great, it just hasn’t stopped raining.
“We seem to be getting these showers every day and the window of opportunity to do anything just hasn’t been there,” he told Rural News. “The growth has been phenomenal and most farmers have got a heap of grass, but we just can’t get out there to do anything with it.”
Davis says he’s well behind with his work schedule because of the rain and farmers are being forced to make some difficult choices.
“A lot of guys who’d normally do pit silage are instead turning this into baleage because their paddocks are so wet.
“They are not sure if they could get trucks across the ground plus the added problem of the mess these’d leave behind anyway,” he says.
According to Davis, a lot of dairy farmers have got grass shut up on their properties for silage or baleage and want to get those paddocks back into rotation quickly.
However, if this weather continues they may just have to put the cows in these paddocks just to get them back into rotation.
Lack of sunshine is also affecting the quality of pasture and there are reports that cow condition may not hold up because of this. But milk production in the Horowhenua is reportedly up by between 12-15%.
The continuous rain has given Davis and his staff little opportunity to get out and do work and when they do get a break in the weather – the work time rules compound the problem. “Like the other day. We had guys turn up here at 8am and then you get a light misty shower which knocked us back a couple of hours. Then it appeared to come right and we got another shower. The result was that we never got baling till 5 o’clock in the afternoon. But as the guys had been here at work since 8 o’clock they had to be finished by 10pm – which means we only had four hours of baling time.”
Davis says while he’s aware that a review of the rules is being undertaken, this isn’t solving his problem right now and there needs to be flexibility.
“If I could say to guys at 8am go home and I’ll call you when we are ready to go that would fine,” he explains. “But under the present system, if they turn up at 8 o’clock the day starts then and they have to have 10 hours break that day. It’s really unworkable.”
