Cyclone rain 'perfect' for farmers

Nuhaka farmer Sefton Alexander is delighted. Photo / Duncan Brown

Destruction was predicted for Hawke's Bay but instead Cyclone Pam delivered liquid relief to farmers.

Wairoa Federated Farmers chairman Sefton Alexander said the rain had been "liquid gold".

"The rain has been perfect. The weather was forecast to be much worse than this and what the farmers in Wairoa have had instead is a boost heading into winter because this rain will help our winter feed. It has been ideal timing," he said.

"A couple more weeks of dry weather and the newly sown grass and winter feed would have been dried off."

Prior to the rain, the dry weather had the potential to destroy winter stock, limiting the amount of cattle the farm would be able to carry.

Mr Alexander said Cyclone Pam could have caused flooding but had not been expected to cause any significant damage because farms in the area were built to handle bad weather.

"I don't think there was any risk of slips and erosion, it was just heavy rain that might have caused a problem.

"The risk was that the ground was very dry and hard so, if we had a heavy downfall, it would have just run off and we would have had flooding.

"But it has been consistent and the ground has been able to absorb the rain, so that hasn't been the case," he said.

From 7pm Sunday evening to 7am on Monday morning there had been 40mm of rain at Wai Station in Nuhaka - a sheep and beef farm.

There had been another 40mm of rain from 7am to 4pm yesterday afternoon, which was the "perfect amount," Mr Alexander said.

Federated Farmers provincial co-ordinator Tania Kerr said the rain had likewise been a "godsend" for her farm on the Napier-Taupo Rd.

"The rain has been what we had hoped for. Any more rain and it would have washed off and there might have been flooding," she said.

Ms Kerr recorded 35mm of rain on Sunday night and 25mm of rain on Monday morning, which she said was "typical" of a storm like this.

Wairoa Emergency Management officer Tim Allan said the region had just caught the edges of the storm and Wairoa had instead received much-needed rain.

"We have had no flooding and the water level in the [Wairoa] river hasn't even registered on our water levels. It has just been a timely rain really."

The river was expected to have reached orange "alert" level on the scale but the water had not even reached the green "safe" level.

"We have had one road close voluntarily because of a fallen tree but it was opened quickly and a couple of the schools in the area have closed but, other than that, we have not been affected," he said.

Mr Allan said the council had, however, taken preventative measures by alerting people to the risks Cyclone Pam might pose.

"We don't want to scaremonger because it might be nothing. You can't overstate weather patterns but you can't understate them either just in case they do cause problems."