The Country 29/10/25: Blair Drysdale talks to Jamie Mackay

This Southland arable farmer says the 2025 spring is, unbelievably, worse than 2024’s awful offering. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Let's head to a Southland arable farm to wrap the
show today, Blair Blocker, Drisdale. We've been going to the
great cities of the world today, Blair belf is not
really one of those.

Speaker 2 (00:11):
You always need to be slash, an't you.

Speaker 1 (00:14):
Yeah, hey, it's Look, we've been talking lots about the
dairy farmers. Obviously they need the power to milk the cows.
When we've talked about that, the sheep farmers, the late
lambing ones in the South Island have been smacked by
the snow. How tough is it being an arable farmer
at the moment because you only haven't got these awful
ground conditions, you can't get stuff into the ground. You're

(00:35):
also not being paid much at the moment.

Speaker 2 (00:39):
No, everyone's definitely got their problems at the moment, Jamie.
For us in the arable world really, at the moment,
the biggest one that's trying to time applications to crops
really and and the most important ones right now are
growth regular This for autumn Barley's one and our funger
sides on wheat, so get my autum. Barley's begging for
its last growth regulator and it's blowing it's us off again.

(01:01):
It doesn't look like we'll get a gap until sad
day to get it done. So that's pretty You know,
somebody's time is pretty critical in the arable world, and
if you it's not something that you know better late
than never. They need to be pretty well timed to
be effective, or as you're spending a lot of money
per hector and not giving the desired results. So yeah,
look in this, you know we're I don't really know
whether I'm behind or a head of the game, or

(01:22):
whether anyone really knows at the moment. Aren't compared to
last year, it's actually pretty similar in the respective seeds
in the ground. I think it's worse. It's a lot
colder's attempts aren't just ten and a half degrees here today,
we've had crops in the ground for a fortnight days.
Inmbraska's they're only just poking their head up. The spring
barley that's been in fifteen days is just struggling to

(01:44):
poke through. So here's calding your guys. We've got peas
in the ground. Off left. My pea's in the bags
at the moment. They don't like these civil conditions, all
cold and wet, so miles stay in the bag till
next week more than likely. Look at the forecast. So
there's some battles out there, that's for sure. And just
it's been blowing. It's us in September. I mean, great
if your sailor, because it have been plenty of high
speed you off, you're going past. But that's about it

(02:05):
for us. It's been challenged to do spraying fury four. Yeah,
get seeds in the ground. So a lot of people
got a lot of work to do, hear them.

Speaker 1 (02:11):
Yet Yeah, absolutely, Look, a problem shared is a problem halved.
And everyone's talking about networking even getting off farm, which
seems impossible for a lot of farmers at the moment.
But I know Old Pete Turner up the road and
Mosbin they've got a windshut and Mosban on Friday night,
and I know communities right around the country are holding
little events like this just just for the old mental health.

(02:32):
I've got thirty seconds on this one.

Speaker 2 (02:35):
Yeah, and we had one on Friday farmer shout because
there was another challenging spring. It turned in a bit
of a community one because no one had any power,
water or anything else. That means are talking. But yeah,
conversation goes a long way if I go back to
twenty ten when it was a real bad spring. You know, mate,
ring may have our six in this morning, din't actually
say helload you see just see what the SUPs and
taps do we do now? Blocker? I said, I don't know, mate,

(02:55):
that we yarned for fifteen twenty minutes and we both
feld a whole lot better about it. So yet you
can't be having yarn And I shot around to Make's
place this morning. Yeah, I had coffee because wis second
the morning in the wind, so it's a pretty important
thing to go and do.

Speaker 1 (03:07):
You've got a good week in front of you. That's
the only positive at the moment. Good luck there, Blair Blocker, Drysdale, Southland,
arable farmer,