Mackay said he was surprised to learn that snow hardly ever settled in the Alexandra town itself.
Duffy said he'd been there 20 years and could count on one hand the number of times snow had actually settled in the town - but the hills surrounding "cop it" a fair bit.
With a few high-country farmers in Duffy's neck of the woods, Mackay asked how they were getting on with lambing.
Duffy said that farmers around Omarama, the Lakes District and Alexandra were only just getting into it now, with the last couple of days proving to be tough in the hill country for lambing or calving.
Mackay and Duffy talked about the Spring Cattle Sales, where 3350 cattle were sold across four different venues.
The sales started on September 21 in South Otago, at the Balclutha Sale Yards, where there was a yarding of 1020.
Duffy said it was a "good size yarding" with the best crowd he'd seen in a long time.
It was also live-streamed, with buyers from Southland through to North Canterbury watching online which made for a good sale, he said.
Mackay said there was a lot of interest in beef cattle at the moment.
Duffy agreed, saying buyers in Balclutha had told him many farmers were chasing two-year-old cattle - with very few two-year-old cattle available.
Farmers were "chasing the short-term stuff," as many had winter crops left over that they wanted to utilise, he said.
The NZ Merino Shears were held the weekend prior in Alexandra but Duffy didn't attend.
However, he said wool rep Graham Bell went and reported back that it was a great event, hugely successful with big crowds making for a big occasion.
Mackay said some shearers would be pretty keen to get going after such a disrupted season heading into the pre-lambing season.
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Duffy had experienced his most challenging pre-lamb seasons in the years he'd been at Alexandra. An "extremely wet" July didn't help either, he said.
"In fact, I think Clyde recorded the wettest July on record.
"So [there were] a lot of sheep were hanging around for probably a couple of weeks down around sheds and close by, waiting for shearing.
"That put a lot of pressure on the stock and the farmers, to be honest."
Duffy said that generally, Otago ewes were lighter in condition going into winter, as many parts of the region had a dry Autumn, which added extra stress.
However, he was pleased to report that there had been other good cattle sales.
There was one at Palmerston covering East Otago, Mount Benger covering Central Otago and one at Oamaru.
"At all those sales there were good crowds [and] very good demand for good quality cattle.
"I think farmers enjoyed getting out off the farms for a day and catching up with everybody during lambing and calving also".
