It was the second decent deluge this year and it left Hunter farmers grinning from ear to ear.
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But the rain hasn’t gone as far as they hoped.
The ground is so hard from being scorched that it will take a lot more rain to fill dams and creeks and allow moisture to sink below the top soil.
Ninety-four millimetres fell in the Upper Allyn between Sunday and Monday – the highest rainfall recorded in the region’s farming areas.
Gloucester was not far behind with 81mm, Seaham had 62mm, Maitland recorded 56mm – one millimetre more than Dungog and Gresford - and Stoney Creek at Scone received 54mm, while the Scone township recorded only 21.2mm.
Singleton received 55.6mm while Denman recorded 30.4mm and Murrurundi had 21.4mm.
WeatherWatch climate specialist Don White said the region could expect between 10 and 15mm on Sunday and Monday, and a few showers next week. He said there was a 60 per cent chance of average rainfall during autumn.
Dairy farmer Matt Neilson, who had 70mm in the rain gauge at his Bandon Grove property north of Dungog, will plant 20 acres of oats this week – his first crop in the ground in several months.
It’s his only chance at having some winter feed to keep his dairy cows nourished. He used all of his hay reserves last month which were supposed to sustain the herd during winter.
He has been feeding the cows straw – which isn’t an ideal diet – to keep them alive and said a lot more rain was needed to grow pastures.
“We’re still feeding everything because there is still not enough feed around. There are still a lot of dams around the place that don’t have much water in them at all.
We will get a bit of growth out of this rain, if we don’t get any more we aren’t going to be much better off in another month or two months time,
- Dairy farmer Matthew Neilson
The Buy A Bale Hunter fundraising campaign – a partnership between the Mercury, Newcastle Herald, Dungog Chronicle, Scone Advocate, Hunter Valley News and charity Rural Aid – has reached $100,000.
The long-term effects will be felt for up to 12 months.
That is equivalent to 900 round bales of hay which would feed 900 cattle for one week. There are more than 820,000 beef cattle and more than 73,000 dairy cows in the Hunter.
Donate: buyabale.com.au/hunter or Rural Aid; St George Bank; BSB 114879; account 439938530.
Belinda-Jane Davis
Passionate about community news
Passionate about community news
