Wet season leaves Northland farmers smiling

Pioneer brand products area manager for Whangarei and Wellsford Corey Thorn said the Northland summer had been outstanding for crops like the "pretty impressive" maize he is standing alongside at Chris Ruiterman's dairy farm at Tomarata, south of Mangawhai.

The weather over summer brought favourable conditions for most Northland farms, with the droughts which have so frequently plagued much of the region in the past moving further south.

Garth Preston, who with his brother Lyall milks up to 880 cows on 350ha at Ruawai, knows how hard drought can be. At this time in 2014 the brothers had to send a quarter of their herd to the works or to off-farm grazing, and palm kernel to feed the rest of the cows cost about $10,000 a week.

In winter last year heavy rain was the problem, but with a lot of silage made earlier the cows produced well. The wet continued into spring and when tractors could not work their silage paddocks the Prestons used a helicopter to spread urea for the first time in their farm's history.

"Early summer conditions were dry and we had just gone to once-a-day milking to reduce stress on the cows when on January 5 we got the first shower of a total of 420mm of rain which saved our season," Garth Preston said.

He was to start making 30ha of silage and was looking forward to a record season with the only cloud on the horizon his fears of the possibility of another wet winter ahead.

Les King, who does dairying, beef and forestry on 332ha at Omanaia in the Hokianga, experienced a similarly favourable season. Good rain had produced "too much grass", with Mr King explaining that he didn't like to be picky but his dairy herd's production declined if they ate too much kikuyu.

It was a different story with his beef bulls "piling on 50-60kg" and he was anticipating a fat cheque when they were sold.

Fonterra Shareholders Council Ward 1 Northern Northland representative Terence Brocx, who milks 650 cows on two farms totalling about 250ha at Okaihau, said the season had started wet and cold, but had settled down and he had got in a good maize crop which had been a relief after a drought crop failure last year.

His milk production was 8 per cent ahead of last season and he had heard others with production 10 per cent ahead.

"It's not an exceptional year, but we're having a good summer with an average payout which is quite a relief after drought experiences in the past," Mr Brocx said.

"Overall, it's been a good season in Northland. I think most farmers are quite happy."

Andrew Fleming, who with his wife Angelea farms a total of 720 cows on two 170ha dairy units at Mangawhai, said the past couple of seasons had been tough but the weather since January had been fabulous, despite arriving a fraction late.

"We had lost some production, but we've been gaining it back for a month," he said.