Watch NZH Local Focus: Hawke's Bay's driest January since 1950

Rain may have been in the air for one day - but it's been a long, hot, windy summer season - and Hawke's Bay is tinder dry.

Drought has not yet been declared - but farmers fear it is not far off.

Farmer Bruno Chambers says: "The few drops today, they didn't even wash the car, no it won't be enough to do anything."

"It's quite nice to have a day like this, because it's much easier going out and working and feeling like you're enjoying the day rather than feeling like you're being baked the whole time."

Mr Chambers has just purchased a few hundred ewes, he says he hopes he doesn't regret that decision with no rain forecast for at least the next nine days.

"We have still got some grass, but with the prevailing westerlies that have existed in the last month or so, and the extreme temperatures, the grass that we had has rapidly evaporated so we're not anywhere as comfortable as we thought we would be at this time of the year."

MetService figures show January rainfall so far is the lowest for that month since 1950.

But with eight days still to go before the month's end, this could change.

Hawke's Bay Regional Council Climate Scientist Dr Kathleen Kozyniak says since November, rainfall has been below the monthly average.

"We had about half of our November rainfall and half of our December rainfall and at the moment we are probably tracking at 30 percent of our January rainfall."

But Kahuranaki Station manager Paul Robinson, says he's noticed a lot more wind this summer.

Mr Robinson says they are "a little bit better off at this stage," than they were last year.

"But it was only parts of Hawke's Bay last year that were actually dry, a lot of Hawke's Bay [was] fine, but we've unloaded a bit of stock earlier this year, we've sold store lambs a bit early and that's helped us but we're certainly starting to burn off now."

Fire bans are in place and Hawke's Bay Regional Council is managing 34 different water bans on irrigation - impacting not only on farmers - but on everyone in the district.

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