Waikato dairy farmers face feed shortage due to wet weather

Sharemilker, and Waikato Federated Farmers dairy chair, Matthew Zonderop said there had not been a good dry spell since October. Photo / Matthew Zonderop

By Sally Murphy of RNZ

Dairy farmers in Waikato are facing a feed shortage - with consistent rain destroying pastures.

A sharemilker in Te Poi, and Waikato Federated Farmers dairy chair, Matthew Zonderop said the region had not really had a decent dry spell since October.

“We’ve had strong gusts of wind which have been driving the rain, it’s very wet, the water table is extremely high and grasses are turning yellow from being saturated, so it’s pretty grim.

“There’s going to be a feed shortage. We’re using a lot of our spring supplement now to feed the cows because we can’t feed them enough grass because the growth rates are very low, so yeah we don’t have enough feed.”

Zonderop said any grass that was around was quickly trampled into the ground by the cows because the soil was so sodden.

“Because of all the rain the water table is really high, so it doesn’t take much for my paddocks to flood.

“Farmers are well versed at winters in Waikato so they can cope but we’re getting to the point where we are not coping.”

Farmers were taking more drastic measures like standing cows off on yards overnight, he said.

“It’s hard on the farmers’ mental well-being as well at the moment because we just don’t know where to go. We don’t know which way to turn anymore because our options are running out, it’s quite stressful.”

Bart van de Ven, a sharemilker in Springdale near Morrinsville, said the soil on his farm was so water-logged that only 5mm of rain causes flooding.

The wet weather was causing big problems on his farm, he said.

“We had a pasture cover of 2600 around the 15th of May and we now have a pasture cover of 2100 which is kind of unusual because normally during the winter time you have dry cows and you go on a longer round and build up grass for calving but we’ve actually gone down which is the main worry for us.

“The paddocks are flooding and it takes a while for the water to drain away so we have to take the cows off a little bit more than we’re used to so there’s certainly no weight gain on the cows at the moment.”

Van de Ven said there was not enough grass around but he was lucky that he had a really good summer and made a lot of silage.

Weather Watch duty forecaster Philip Duncan said things were not going to get much better anytime soon.

“It looks as though there’s at least 60 to 100 millimetres of rain coming to the Waikato in the next four weeks, mostly due to low pressure still crossing over the South Island and some parts of the country.

“And obviously with more westerlies blowing, that does encourage that rain to go all the way up the North Island, so Auckland and Northland will also get rain but it does seem that the heaviest falls will hit Waikato southwards down towards Taranaki and the west coast of the South Island.”

- RNZ