Student volunteer Connor Grant (left) and strawberry grower Donald Crosby, who is rebuilding his strawberry farm in Eskdale. Photo / Michael Farr
Student volunteer Connor Grant (left) and strawberry grower Donald Crosby, who is rebuilding his strawberry farm in Eskdale. Photo / Michael Farr
A Hawke’s Bay strawberry grower has committed to regrowing tonnes of delicious berries in flood-hit Esk Valley.
Despite the risk of future flooding, Donald Crosby wants to expand his business and grow other fruit and veges on his property in Eskdale north of Napier.
He lost 60,000 strawberry plants and damage to three large greenhouses at the front of the property has been a continual reminder of the sheer force of the floods, for motorists passing by on State Highway 5.
“The damage is quite graphic-looking, but structurally they are not that badly damaged,” he said.
The strawberry farm in the aftermath of Cyclone Gabrielle. Photo / Paul Taylor
“With how much survived, while it was a lot of work, it was an obvious thing to have a go at rebuilding and it was possible.”
He has been buoyed by plenty of support from the community, including “awesome” help from the Hawke’s Bay Clean Up Team.
On Thursday, a 30-strong group of university students from the Student Volunteer Army descended on the property to help.
“It is really awesome to have the support from the community and it is continuing,” he said.
“It is massively helpful because doing jobs like digging silt and moving [things around] is really hard to do by yourself, whereas when you have a handful of people helping it is so much easier and so much faster.”
Crosby said while he would have liked to have been further along in terms of rebuilding his property and business, a lot of effort had gone into setting up his new rainwater collection system, which will help the plants grow.
"It turns out the groundwater is quite a bit worse than what it was pre-cyclone.
“It has too much manganese in it and the strawberry plants don’t like it.”
He said if all went well, he would like to have one of his large greenhouses completely rebuilt and growing strawberries next year, in time to harvest during winter 2025.
If he were to use all three greenhouses again in future to grow strawberries, he would be able to grow about 35,000 plants – enough to produce 25-30 tonnes of strawberries a year.
He said his plan was to also grow other fruit and vegetables on the property.
“I was solely strawberries pre-cyclone, but I am changing now to strawberries and other things as well because there is a real market shift toward buying [directly] from growers and buying fresh produce.
“So, I’m hoping to grow half a dozen different [fruit and veges] and sell it all at the gate.”
He conceded he was “nervous” about the flood risks, but would push ahead with the plans.
He used to live on the property in a cottage, but that building was too badly damaged in the cyclone and was recently demolished. He evacuated in the nick of time during the floods.
Student Volunteer Army member Connor Grant, who hails from Hawke’s Bay and studies engineering in Christchurch, said it had been great to help out.
“It’s good to get into it, especially a place like this, [growing up we] drove past here all the time.”
The Student Volunteer Army held its clubs conference in Napier to support the region, with leaders attending from universities nationwide.
AA Insurance sponsored the conference and the voluntary work at the strawberry farm.
Student Volunteer Army Foundation head of programmes Cat Robertson said students from five universities helped out on Thursday in Esk Valley as part of the conference, after striking up a relationship with the Hawke’s Bay Clean Up Team.
“It has been a very good hands-on learning experience for our clubs.”
Gary Hamilton-Irvine is a Hawke’s Bay-based reporter who covers a range of news topics including business, councils, breaking news and cyclone recovery. He formerly worked at News Corp Australia.
