Lucky to be around to dry out

At their height large parts of his farm were under water, the floods lapping the entrance to his cowshed which was cut off from the main farm. All he and his family could do was wait for the water to recede. 

“The good thing was there was no silt and the water was clean. Our biggest stress was whether the grass was going to die or not but it appears we have got away with it. The cowshed filled to within one inch of the electric motors, then it receded.”

The other issue for the Moxhams was finding extra grazing, not easy because they are organic and the cows could only go on organic land. By drying off a few cows they were winter milking on another small organic farm they own and managed to cope. The cows are now back and are being grazed on dry areas.

Moxham says they lost none of their precious supplementary feed, stored on high ground as a precaution against a flood. All the sheds and houses apart from the main cowshed are on high ground.

The stopbank that burst and caused most of the flooding has now been repaired and water from some low lying areas has been pumped out.

Moxham vividly recalls having only a few minutes at the height of the flood to get the cows to high ground early in the morning – very stressful. He is full of praise for the efforts of Fonterra, the regional council and others who offered assistance.

“The main cowshed should be ok but we need to get the electrics checked because there were wires underground that could have got water in them. Some electrical equipment for the effluent pump got drowned but it seems to have dried out and is running ok.”

Despite the problems of the last week Moxham says he feels lucky, especially when he looks at the devastation in Whanganui.