Rural Australia rallies to support NSW and Queensland farm flood victims
Floods have swept farmers’ cattle, fodder and fencing down rivers, destroyed homes and smothered pastures, but the community support is strong.
Floods have swept Northern NSW and Queensland farmers’ cattle, fodder and fencing down rivers, destroyed homes and smothered pastures, but the swift flowing water failed to erode the spirit of rural communities that have rallied support.
“We’ve been overwhelmed with offers of support from farmers near and far - the Atherton Tablelands to Shepparton and King Island,” Lismore dairy farmer Paul Weir said, who watched half his 300-cow herd swept away by the floods last week.
“I’m humbled. It’s been an emotional rollercoaster.”
At a local level farmers have stepped in to milk neighbours’ herds and offer fodder, while even townspeople rustled up missing cows, with one even found outside Bunnings.
The short-term focus of most farmers has been getting the power back on or generators installed, disposing of dead cattle, rebuilding fences and sourcing fodder.
Tatham dairy farmer Maureen McDonald, whose property was inundated, saved her greatest praise for electrician Brett Hardwick, who spent three days getting her flooded dairy operational, even cleaning out a feed silo to boot.
“Without him we would not be operating,” Ms McDonald said.
Others, such as Casino dairy farmer Terry Toohey, used his broad network to keep in touch with hard hit farmers and co-ordinate the airlifting of generators, pumps and electricians into properties.
He said about 20 dairy farmers had been severely affected in the hardest hit parts of the Northern Rivers Region of NSW, with one even forced to pitch a tent on the dairy roof last week, while he waited for the water to subside.
Across the border in Queensland EastAUSMilk president Matthew Trace said the damage was generally not as severe, but there was still producers who lost 10 to 20 cows, needed fodder and help re-fencing.
He said his own region of Gympie was hardest hit, along with parts of the Lockyer Valley and Beaudesert region.
“We’re able to get plenty of fodder from South Burnett and the Darling Downs, but we’re not in the same critical situation as northern NSW,” he said.
Australia’s largest farmer owned meat processing co-operative in Casino, half an hour’s drive from Lismore, was in the midst of co-ordinating fodder donations and deliveries this week.
By early Monday Casino Food Cooperative livestock manager Heidi Hayes, said about 60 farmers had called for help in sourcing fodder. She also asked that anyone wanting to donate hay or silage call her on (0429) 640-047.
“We’ve had people just turning up with fodder on the back of trucks and just been unloading it on the hay pad and then we’re dispersing it,” Ms Hayes said.
But sourcing fuel is still a problem.
“It’s a bit like Mad Max up here, you have to wait hours for fuel,” Mr Weir said.
When friends ring to ask how they can help, Mr Weir said “I ask if they can bring a jerry can of diesel over with the scones”.
BlazeAid operations manager Melissa Jones, daughter of the volunteer organisation’s founder Kevin Butler, has already set up a fencing camp in Casino and is looking for sites at Gympie and the Lockyer Valley.
She said they had 12 volunteers setting up at Casino, but had room for 50 and appealed for more help, given she already had 100 farmers seeking help to re-fence. (Contact 0418 990 267)
Mrs McDonald and husband Steve, have already enlisted BlazeAid’s help, after losing nearly all their fencing.
She said the damage was made worse by the floods sweeping tonnes of the exotic aquatic weed water hyacinth up against fences, flattening them.
“We did lose half the herd, which was swept away, but they were back the next morning,” Ms McDonald said. “But they were back the next morning.”
However the couple say they lost 60 springing heifers, after the flood peaked 1.5m above the 2008 level they had planned for.
Ms McDonald said she and Steve thought they had prepared the farm for the worst case flood, installing a large cement feed pad, building mounds in the dry-cow paddock to keep cattle out of harm’s way and storing silage on their highest country.
NORCO director Heath Cook took one of the most startling images of the floods as he drove into Lismore last Friday morning to visit the dairy co-operative’s headquarters, showing the bloated carcass of a dairy cow that had been washed onto the veranda of a Lismore auto business at the flood’s peak.
Mr Cook said every Australian needed to see the extent of the damage, from which he feared some residents would never recover.
As one of the town’s biggest employers NORCO is reeling from the impact of four to five metres of water washing through critical processing lines in its ice-cream factory, which was undergoing a $30m upgrade and the decommissioning of its feed mill.
In the meantime the NSW, Queensland and Federal Government are offering flood-affected farmers grants of up to $75,000 to help with the recovery.
But EastAUSMilk vice-president Graham Forbes said farmers needed “major assistance, not just the $75,000, if they’re going to stay in the industry. Otherwise they will exit.”
Mr Weir said one of the big issues would be regaining affordable insurance.
“I don’t’ want to put my insurance (payout) into a sinking ship,” Mr Weir said.
Donations or offers to volunteer with BlazeAid can be made HERE.
Other groups offering support include Drought Angels, with farmers able get relief payments of $1500 by calling 07 4662 7371 or by filling in the form HERE, while donations can be made HERE.
The Queensland and NSW Government is also asking farmers to fill out damage assessment forms to help them direct assistance, they can be found:
Click HERE for Queensland farmers.
Click HERE for NSW farmers
Support lines also operate in Queensland on 13 25 23
NSW on 1800 814 647
DAMAGE TO CROPS:
Vegetable crops have been severely damaged or simply washed away after the week of intense flooding across NSW and Queensland.
With flood waters still high in some places, the full extent of crop, livestock and farm damage is not yet known.
Queensland vegetable grower Steven Moffatt said some of the paddocks on his Tarome property would reach just 50 to 60 per cent of their yield capacity this season.
“We’ve been affected, not to the extent of what the Lockyer Valley has been, and those closer to the coast,” Mr Moffatt said. “Our crop losses are realised at the time (of the floods), but also when we should be planting, and we will have gaps in our production. The other part is we’ve got crops in the ground, which haven’t been washed away … but their full yield potential, we were hoping for about 93 per cent, and that’s now about 50 to 60 per cent.”
Queensland Agriculture Minister Mark Furner said the flooding has significantly affected producers across 17 local government areas.
“We’ve had reports of significant loss of fences, impacts to infrastructure and supply chains, lost cattle, crop losses, and severe erosion and soil loss,” Mr Furner said.
“Department of Agriculture and Fisheries staff have also been on the ground assessing the damage to farm infrastructure, crops and livestock where it is safe to do so. Some areas are still covered in water.”
Pulse Australia chief executive Nick Goddard said about 25 per cent of Australia’s soybean crop may have been affected by the floods.
“We were looking at having a very good soybean crop, but a lot of it around Lismore has been badly hit,” Mr Goddard said.
“The Northern Rivers area has a large area of soybeans, about 50 per cent (of the national crop), and of that about 50 per cent has been hit by the floods.”