Drought or dry years are inevitable. It is important to determine what constitutes a drought or dry year in any given environment. For example, it may be a failed spring followed by a failed autumn.
Having a sound plan in place (ideally before the poor season hits) will support decision making when faced with dry conditions.
Planning for drought includes:
- keeping adequate feed reserves
- creating containment areas and drought lots
- developing a plan to determine which stock to sell and which to keep and feed in the containment area or drought lot
- reviewing time of lambing and weaning according to pasture supply and feed reserves.
Trigger points are dates determined by the calendar or an external measure (e.g. rainfall received, percentage of feed in the paddock, condition score of ewes) beyond which decisions (e.g. to buy or sell livestock, start supplementary feeding or move sheep to a different paddock) should not be delayed.
Some of the actions to consider during dry seasons are:
- Identify which sheep to sell and when to sell them.
- Identify which sheep to retain and when to start supplementary feeding.
- Review feeding options (e.g. supplementary feeding).
- Investigate the cost of feeding (including feed and labour costs).
- Turn off lambs earlier.
- Review water volume and security.
Revisiting and adjusting trigger points is an important part of a proactive management plan – keep reviewing plans and updating them, but don’t put off the inevitable. Early decisions are often the ones made with the least amount of emotion as they are not forced decisions. This is an important part of managing dry seasons and emerging in a resilient state (physically, mentally and financially) ready to take advantage of the good times.
Decisions about which stock to keep or sell will depend on their value at the time, the probable cost of feeding, the value of any production that would be gained if they are kept and their future replacement value, should that be necessary. Sheep retained during a drought year, will require supplementary feeding . Consider building containment areas to prepare for drought or dry times. This practice aims to promote animal health and welfare while preserving ground cover and land condition across most of the property. This is achieved by containing livestock to a small area where they are fed a total ration.
Successful containment feeding relies on appropriate site selection, mob size and stocking density, class of sheep and the provision of appropriate nutrition. Developing purpose-built areas for holding sheep while supplementary feeding assists with labour efficiency and animal production, while maintaining ground cover. Maintaining ground cover during dry times ensures country is more ‘rain ready’ and captures rainfall that will contribute to growth of feed.