Carpet rolled out but still a big mess

His herd of 600 dairy cows were standing for days in flooded paddocks and the locals who'd ripped up carpets from their flooded homes provided carpets via the local RSL so his herd could walk and stand safely out of the floodwaters.

The herd was eventually relocated on one drier strip where he could lay out some hay for the herd of mainly Holsteins, Jerseys, mixed breeds and Illawarra cows at his place, Farm Profits.

It's over six months since the floods but the pain goes on. James estimates he's lost 300 cows from prime production due to things such as mastitis. He lost many young calves and for a short-time after the floods the cell count in his millk plummeted from 48 to 9.

Then there was the damage throughout the farm. Sand and rocks and bottles strewn across the paddocks by the floodwaters and then drains blocked everywhere, silted up. Weeds then came down the river and he's now fighting off a cathead infestation.

"It's just never ended since the floods, the amount of work, amout of labour involved has just been enormous."

Luckily Rural Aid provided some workers for a week to help with the clean-up.

He reckons he had over 660mm of rain in the March downpour.

James is a fifth generation dairy farmer and has rarely seen floods like this that engorged his property. He has extensive agricultural research, development and extension skills and has been involved in on-farm research demonstrations to improve pasture production in autumn when forage is most limiting and alternative feeds are expensive.

Just after the floods, the local RSL donated damaged carpet to the Neals, and other local farms, to save their cows by providing cushioning to walk on as many start to go lame after spending days in water. He welcomed the new flood relief package as the costs keep going on and flood repair work never stops.