Ōtorohanga on Sunday, February 15. Photo / RNZ, Marika Khabazi
By Monique Steele and Sally Murphy of RNZ
Stormy weather has cut power to dairy sheds, brought down trees, shelter belts and wiped out vegetable and arable crops.
Ōtorohanga was one of five districts still under a state of emergency after the heavy rain and strong gusts over the weekend.
Michael Woodward, who runs a dairy and goat farm in south Ōtorohanga, said he had a blocked culvert and slips, but nearby farms were worse off.
“East of Ōtorohanga, where the stepper country starts coming in, there’s been a lot of slips in those farms, fences have been taken out,” he said.
“There’s been a small amount of stock loss that we’ve heard of, but as a whole, because the damage has been localised, nearby farmers who haven’t been affected are helping out.”
Woodward said farms along the banks of the Waipā River were most affected.
“Just where the water’s slowly backed up, a lot of damage towards the Ōtorohanga township as well, one of the local primary schools has gone under.”
Woodward said local families helped wash out silt from the school hall that was submerged by floodwaters.
Ōtorohanga Primary School’s leadership team said on Facebook that initial investigations were now underway at the kura.
“Our absolute priority is returning to in-person learning as soon as it is safe to do so,” it read.
“However, current assessments indicate that the full school site is unlikely to be reoccupied for up to four weeks while remediation is completed. As each building is cleared and restored, we may be able to stage the return of classrooms to the site.”
Woodward said thecommunity support was amazing for those most affected by the storms.
The wild weather has left thousands without power across the lower North Island.
Manawatū-Rangitīkei dairy farmer Hamish Easton, who milked 500 cows near Foxton, said most farmers were prepared for power cuts and had generators from previous events.
“We’ve had significant wind overnight, we lost power, but it was back on by 5 am, which is good for the guys out milking early, but the wind has carried on, it’s pretty significant.”
Easton said there were road diversions across parts of the province because of fallen trees, and said farmers should stay local and avoid unnecessary travel or jobs if they could.
Fonterra said it was unable to reach five farms in Manawatū on Sunday night because of floodwaters, but it was working to pick up that milk.
Pirongia Mountain Vegetables said a major part of their winter root vegetable crop had been washed away.
Before photos show lush potato crops - now the same paddock is just a muddy mess.
On Facebook, the company said it was used to flooding and plants above historic high water marks, but this time it was different.
In Horowhenua, large-scale commercial vegetable company Woodhaven Gardens has been affected by strong winds.
Owner Jay Clarke said it looked like the entire zucchini crop had been wiped out.
“The wind escalated last night, it’s caused quite significant crop damage on some of our crops, especially some of the seasonal crops like zucchinis.
“The wind can snap the growing centre, meaning that you will lose that crop, so that’s quite a big hit on our income potentially because we won’t be able to harvest any of that crop now.
“That plant just won’t grow. It’ll die.”
Clarke said some other crops would be touch or go, “we’ll know in a week or so what the full impact will be”.
“We will just have to plough damaged crops back into the land, that has flow-on effects for labour decisions and things like that.”
Clarke said the damage would have flow-on effects for supply as well.
“There could be a lack of supply for some vegetables, but it could take a few weeks for that to appear in the shops.”
- RNZ