Weather delays work on peninsula

Sheep and beef farmer Brendon Cross continues to work around ‘‘frustrating’’ slips triggered by up to 200mm of rainfall in two days across his properties on Otago Peninsula.

Niwa data showed 244mm of rainfall was recorded at Dunedin’s Musselburgh weather station at the neck of the peninsula last month — more than four times the normal October rainfall and about one-third of its normal annual rainfall.

More than half occurred during a single event on October 3 and 4, which led to widespread flooding and a local state of emergency being declared.

The weather station recorded 131mm of rainfall on October 3.

Mr Cross runs about 3600 ewes, 1000 hoggets and about 50 cattle on 850ha of steep hill country on the peninsula, which he and his wife Paula own and lease.

About 180mm of rainfall hit their home block Roselle Farm, a 200ha property near Portobello on the shore of Otago Harbour, which his family has run since the 1840s.

A 330ha leased block at Hereweka received more than 200mm.

During the deluge, a large slip crossed Highcliff Rd and damaged gates, fences, lanes and pasture on a 280ha block he leases on the seaward coast.

Permanent repairs to gates and fences were pending and temporary netting had been installed to contain livestock.

As part of the normal operation, older ewes were lambed separately so they could be offloaded if there was a lack of spring feed available.

Those ewes were sold with lambs at foot due to the impact of the slips, including pasture damage.

However, a slip blocked access to yards and the mob had to moved by road to be loaded on a truck.

‘‘It’s not a big deal but it creates work,’’ he said.

The wet conditions also made tailing lambs a nightmare’’.

Usually tailing yards could be transported across the farm on the back of a ute.

For the first time in living memory, a tractor was needed to move the yards across the farm.

The wet conditions delayed sheep shearing to last week, instead of early October.

Spring had been wetter and colder than normal, and pasture was ‘‘starting to come away’’ in the past fortnight but dry conditions could be biting in another fortnight, he said.

‘‘We are prone to the dry. We don’t stay wet for long.’’

Growing lambs on steep hill country could be an ‘‘Achilles’ heel’’ of a breeding operation.

The farm getting dry was virtually a certainty.

Most of the deluge ran off the steep terrain providing limited moisture for the ground.

About 30mm of rain across three days was as valuable as 180mm in a day and did not require fixing infrastructure.

Erosion was an ongoing issue for hill country farmers.

‘‘You can’t fight gravity,’’ Mr Cross said.

He had been cutting poles and planting them to minimise erosion and protect vulnerable areas.

Securing a supply of poplar poles was ‘‘very difficult’’ and expensive. but it was also an expense to fix fences so there was a balance, he said.