Fair enough on farm

Stephen Korteweg
Stephen Korteweg
''A more traditional summer'' is how Otago Federated Farmers president Stephen Korteweg describes the season.

While it had been a disjointed summer, overall it had been a ''pretty good'' growing season and better than last year.

''All in all, farmers have been reasonably pleased with how its gone,'' Mr Korteweg, a South Otago dairy farmer, said.

There seemed to have been plenty of supplementary feed made and enough sunshine for wheat and barley crops, with reports of good yields.

There had been patches when it seemed to dry out quite quickly and severely, but then came a ''big dollop'' of rain.

Areas like Clydevale were now getting ''a bit dry'' but that was not unusual for this time of the year, he said.

There were reports of very little clover in some pastures, partly due to lack of direct sunlight and also the effects of clover root weevil, which was ''kicking in'' in the region.

In North Otago, local Federated Farmers president Richard Strowger said arable farmers were looking for some sunshine and some ''nice hot days'' to get the harvest in.

Dairy farmers were happy because they had kept getting some moisture, while lambs were a bit slower this year.

Stephen Korteweg
Stephen Korteweg
The past four years had been ''tremendous'' as far as moisture was concerned, in an area that could get very dry.

''All the old-timers keep telling me, `you wait' ... but maybe it's global warming, this is the new North Otago,'' Mr Strowger said.

''It's just typical farming where you've got to make a prediction and run with it,'' he said.

In coastal North Otago, about 45.5mm of rain fell in January, compared to 88.5mm last year, while there was 34mm in December, compared to 112mm in December 2013 and 36mm in November last year compared to 51mm the previous year.

Apart from demand for sheep being ''a bit flat'', it had been a very good season, Omarama farmer Simon Williamson said.

Describing it as ''just an old-fashioned summer'', Mr Williamson said there had been some scorching days but also a lot of wind - unusual for the time of year - which was drying things out.

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