Farmers count cost of brutal battering by record winds and flooding

SOME Tasmanian dairy farmers are being forced to dump their milk as the impact of the weekend’s extreme weather continues.

Large parts of the state including the North West, North and North East have been battered by record breaking winds and torrential rain.

An emergency flood warning is also still in place for residents in the Derwent Valley, as the River Derwent continues to rise to major flood levels.

About 40,000 homes are without power today including many dairy farms, which is causing major issues for producers.

DairyTas regional manager Deb Morice said the recent weather was the most severe she hasseen in her decades in the industry and could not have come at a worse time for farmers.

“It’s terrible because it was a crap season anyway, now we’ve gone from the extremes of dry to the extremes of wet and cold and windy,” she said.

“I have never seen it like this and I talked to some farmers who have been without power for four days now.”
Many producers are in the middle of calving season, a critical time when cows must be milked regularly.

Ms Morice said farmers are using generators where possible to milk their cows, but are also struggling with flooded paddocks and access to stock water due to power outages

.

“Flooding as well as the cold is causing issues, so we’ve lost a few stock,” she said.

“Some trees have come down, but also there have been a few losses because it’s so cold and they are in their vulnerable state of calving and things like that. It is right across the state, but worse in some pockets.”

Ms Morice said there has also been a significant amount infrastructure damage.

“We’ve had pivots go down and lot of barns, and I mean a lot of barns and calf sheds and iron off roofs and things like that so there’s been a lot of damage.”

Ms Morice said some of the worst impacted areas include Yolla, Table Cape and Winnaleah.

She said road closures are also causing issues.

“We’ve had to divert milk tankers around so they can pick up milk and we’ve had to dumpsome milk because they can’t get there to pick it up,” she said.

“Down south there are a couple of farms isolated and there’s a big watch on the DerwentRiver as well. Some farmers have had to put the co

ws on once-a-day milking because they can’t get them to the dairy and back and have enough secure paddocks for them.”

Ms Morice said with the wild weather continuing in some areas, the full extent of the damage will not be known for several days.

Some berry farms have also been hit hard by the extreme winds, which have caused extensive damage to growing tunnels and hot houses.

At the Tasmanian Berries operation near Exton, some tunnels had been completely flattened during last night’s extreme winds.

TasFarmers vegetable council chairman Nathan Richardson described the weather event as horrendous.

He said while he had not seen much infrastructure damage in his area at Thirlstane, the torrential rain had caused a number of issues for farmers including a large number of trees which have been blown down.

“Our district is basically completely sodden,” he said.

“I’d say we’ve only had pretty much one or maybe one and a half days in the last two or three weeks could do any spraying.”

While it is still early in the planting season, Mr Richardson said he would encourage farmers not to rush into planting too early while conditions are so wet.

“You do cringe when you see evidence of soil erosion and paddock scarring and there has been a bit of that,” he said.

“The message I’d say to farmers is be patient and don’t make the situation worse by trying to tick the box and say you’ve got a crop in or a paddock ploughed.”

He said while the current conditions had caused some challenges, the rainfall had helped fill dams and water storages and should help to set things up for a good spring season.