Milk production cut by dry conditions
Drought affected farmers in Taranaki are down to half their normal milk production and winter feed stores as the dry conditions begin to bite on rural incomes, a Rural Support Trust drought update meeting heard.
Around 50 farmers turned up to the meeting at Okato Rugby Club yesterday. It was the eighth of 10 meetings organised by the Taranaki Rural Support Trust in the region since a medium scale drought was officially called by Minister of Agriculture Damian O’Connor on December 23.
The meetings were organised to help farmers plan for the future and offer advice on how to manage the adverse conditions.
Taranaki Rural Support Trust chairman Mike Green said there had not been a drought this bad in the region for 40 years, and farmers were 40 to 50 per cent down on normal milk production.
The priorities were looking after themselves, their animals and their pasture growth - in that order, Green told the meeting.
Coastal Taranaki farmers at the meeting reported 20 to 30 millimetres of rainfall overnight and pasture growth was still low.
‘‘The drought will be here for a while and if the rain comes the damage has already been done,’’ Green said. The drought had occurred two months early and farmers had not been able to produce enough baleage or silage for the next season, he said.
‘‘We are in mid January and there is little or no feed on hand unless it is brought in and this is proving expensive.’’
Contractors were reporting prices rising up to $170 a bale landed on the farm.
Feed was in short supply with as little as 20 per cent normal baleage and silage made in the region this summer.
This had produced a high demand for supplement feed such as palm kernel.
Palm kernel suppliers had increased output to 3200 tonnes a day but deliveries were stretched to meet demand, Green said.
‘‘Farmers will have to grow enough feed themselves to get through to calving. They will have to have enough to milk on, winter on and calve on.’’
Green said up to 20 farms in the region had already dried off.
It was critical to keep body condition scores above 4.5 to enable cows to be in peak condition for calving, he said.
Green said the forecasted rain next week would help lift farmers’ spirits and help ‘‘green up’’ the pasture.
‘‘The drought has put pressure on farmers’ mental heath after a couple of seasons of challenging low payouts, and then going from a long period of extreme wet conditions to suddenly an extremely dry period.
‘‘Everyone is in a similar situation whether they are once a day, or 16 hour, milking.
‘‘The ideal is to keep the milking herd going and the cashflow without impacting too much on next season.’’