Hawke's Bay farmers desperate to find winter feed for stock as colder weather looms

Sourcing feed has been tough for one local farmer Josie Brensum.



All Josie Brensrum wanted was a piece of land for her ponies.

Buying a lifestyle block in Hawke's Bay this year, she realised her dream, but a severe drought was not in the plan.

"Having a little bit more to manage, that, with a drought was a bit of an eye opener," she told 1 NEWS.

Sourcing feed for them and her two sheep has been tough.

She jumped at the chance to stock up for winter with the Hawke's Bay Rural Advisory Group and Hawke's Bay Regional Council putting on feed runs for the nearly 2000 lifestyle farms in the region.

“They are selling out within three to four hours so that just shows you the demand for this feed," group member and regional councillor Will Foley told 1 NEWS at the run today.

Local young farmers were on hand today to load up over 40,000 kilograms of hay. Eskview farmer Cameron Walker was one of them getting stuck in.

“It’s rare as hen's teeth at the moment all this extra feed, so everyone just loves it.”

Today’s opportunity could be the last.

Bales of hay are like gold to farmers but they're becoming increasingly harder to find. The Rural Advisory Group says Hawke’s Bay still needs 300,000 thousand of them, costing up to $42 million.

“Look, we’ve done a massive search nationwide for three to four weeks, it really looks like we are scraping the bottom of the barrel,” Will Foley says, admitting feed will eventually run out.

Recent rainfall has turned some spots green but the advice is to get rid of stock now as worries for animal welfare grow.

“The risk is that it turns cold it turns wet and we fall into an even deeper feed deficit hole and things get worse and live stock will go hungry,” Mr Foley says. 

Central and local government money is available to fund the transporting of feed and the public can donate via a Givealittle page.

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