FARMERS in Hamilton and the surrounding district are facing drier conditions and having to adapt to the exceptionally tough environment in the region lately.

Area-averaged rainfall for Victoria in March was 9.2 millimeters, which was 78 per cent below the 1961–1990 average, making it the seventh driest March on record and the driest since 1986.

Large areas of central and western Victoria received less than 20 per cent of their March average.

Some areas didn’t even collect five percent of their March average, including Melbourne, Ballarat and Bendigo; Hamilton received just 0.8mm, well below the 39.8mm average.

Many western Victorian farmers and decision makers had prepared for drier conditions following a warning last year by the Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences, that the seasonal outlook pointed to reduced farm outputs this season.

Victorian Farmers Federation (VFF) president, Emma Germano said, “by and large, we’ve had incredibly good farming conditions for the past few years here in Victoria, that has resulted in record harvests and outputs.”

“That can’t last forever,” she said.

“It’s a difficult balancing act, with farmers juggling skyrocketing input prices and volatile market conditions”.

 Two local farmers, both members of the VFF livestock council, discussed what mitigating measures can be used to ensure animal welfare and ongoing productivity.

Local veterinarian, Dr Kathryn Robertson has a farm just out of Hamilton and also works as a vet privately - Livestock Vet Services.

She said feeding livestock in dry times can be very challenging, both economically, and on mental health.

“The key to feeding livestock is to be prepared,” Dr Robertson said.

“It’s much easier and more economical to maintain body condition of livestock than to wait until they are in poor condition and then try and get them to put on weight.

“There are lots of good resources available regarding drought and containment feeding such as the Victorian and NSW Department of Agricultural website and the MLA website.

“We are also lucky to have a lot of agricultural advisers in this area that you can speak to.

“Dry times may not just be about feeding livestock - it may be making the decision to sell livestock early while they are in good body condition.”

Yulecart farmer, Brad Venning has been farming for around 40 years.

He said there were still a lot of areas in the district that were awaiting the autumn break.

“It’s got cold, and stock are starting to need more metabolic energy for maintenance,” he said.

“There are areas where stock are calving or getting close to lambing and their feed requirements are increasing.

“Not all areas around here - there are small areas that have had a bit of rain and some feed coming through.”

Mr Venning also advised farmers to seek advice through any of the several avenues available to source helpful information on what to do in low feed conditions.

“So, there’s quite a few things that either AWI or Ag Vic put out - there are publications that will lead people through what those requirements are.

“And then there’s the consultants and private vets - some of those obviously have a fee for service but there’s different places people can get help - local stock agents can walk people through things.”

Mr Venning said it was also very important to check out the ‘fit to load’ requirements.

“(Stock) needs to be checked out before they’re loaded,” he said.

“There’s legal requirements before you can load.”

While the transporter is responsible for the animals during the journey, the consignor is responsible for the assembling and preparation of livestock, including the assessment of whether animals are fit to load.

“Some people might be under a lot of pressure financially,” Mr Venning said.

“Cost of doing business is increasing - our costs have gone up and the price we’re receiving for produce has come back a bit.

“There’s the Rural Financial Counselling Service (RFS) - sometimes an independent person from RFS can increase their knowledge about what they can and can’t do before they talk to their bank manager - if they are experiencing financial difficulties financial counsellors would be a good spot to go to.”

“It’s not an extraordinarily late break yet but it’s not an early one either and after a poor spring where there wasn’t a lot of hay cut, it’s making things more difficult.”

He also stressed the importance that people needed to look after themselves, particularly their mental health in times of tough conditions.

“People need to look after their own health too - talk to other people - don’t go out and feed some stock without talking to other people - and look out for your neighbour as well,” Mr Venning said.

“Community is very important as we can support one another - everyone’s got their own individual circumstances - we need to pull together.”

“There’s help out there in all sorts of different forms - there’s support there for the people and how we look after our stock as well.

“Things will improve - the sun will come out and we’ll have plenty of feed.”