Farmers in parched areas of the North Island have been left frustrated by the after effects of cyclone Lusi – with very little rain falling on the areas most in need.
The storm passed across the country on the weekend, bringing heavy downpours, rough seas and high winds to many areas – particularly the North Eastern part of the North, and the middle of the country.
Farmers in parts of the Waikato, Northland and the South West of the North Island were counting on a big low pressure system breaking the drought, but some areas only received as little as 8mm over the two days.
Some Government forecasters were promising between 50-100mm in the Southern Waikato, but in the end that region didn’t break double figures.
Farmers in Western Northland will be hoping for follow up rain in the upcoming weeks, after relatively low levels from Lusi.
Federated Farmers said the cyclone was, on the whole, a big disappointment.
Many dairy farmers have already dried off this season, while sheep and beef producers are destocking in the worst hit regions.
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westcoast on 17/03/2014 3:38am
Tokoroa did get over 20mm
and thats south waikato
so not sure about your statement about did not even get over double digits in south waikato?
but yes, areas further north in the waikato did not get to double digits
which was very disapointing
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Lee Sloper on 17/03/2014 2:01am
The mad Westerlies are destructive here and I know them very well, so when I saw Met’s NW forecast I was taking no chances. The big NW here in January was destructive and even tore a person’s entire bean rack and plants clean out of the ground and destroyed the lot. That in mind, I shifted about 100 plants into shelter from anything Westerly. Yeah well, we were hit by rampant North Easterlies and my stuff blown around the place. Feeling irate about that today, as I was last night. A major N attracts big low level NE downslopes here which can be in excess of 100 km/h; they blast directly into us, underneath any other flow. There is a collosal difference here between NW and N flows here. Think I need to go back to ignoring MetService’s forecasts and concentrate VUW’s upper wind maps as well as WeatherWatch’s forecasts. When it comes to destructive winds, the flow makes all the difference in the world as to what we get hit with here.
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Guest on 17/03/2014 12:42am
All the media outlets were a bit over the top with this one. Up there with the America’s Cup hype.
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WW Forecast Team on 17/03/2014 2:15am
A lot of the FAQ stories and updates at WW were to deal with incorrect reports in the media and to clarify more extreme reports. Weather is a free and easy news story for them.
– WW
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Guest on 17/03/2014 2:41am
You guys always track the cyclones and their paths and provide us with a range of possibilities. I think this event, coming so soon after the storm that smashed Banks Peninsula and Christchurch, was jumped on by some outlets (including TVNZ – who love anything that might involve Auckland) and promoted as something ‘extreme’. Extreme because a ‘tropical cyclone must be worse than just a low that wet Canterbury’. I do however think the Metservice did a good job – as did Metvuw, because they seemed to have the track heading further west from early on. The systyem certainly ‘died’ once it crossed the country last night.
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Guest on 17/03/2014 12:15am
30mm for Hunua, now we just need a follow up,
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Matt on 16/03/2014 10:30pm
I am near Raglan and over the entire weekend I measured 16mm. All up this has been an even drier summer than last year with only 17mm over the whole of Febuary (54mm last year) and 32mm so far in March.
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pete on 16/03/2014 10:15pm
we rceived 40mm in south rotorua,was just enough to be of some use
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Celtickiwi on 16/03/2014 9:21pm
After what I saw on the way to New Plymouth from Tauranga – argh! I am really feeling for our farmers.
WW team, is there any sign of another rainmaker in the long range forecast?
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