It's dry.
Very dry in the Upper Hunter.
It's getting closer to winter as each week goes by and without barely a drop of rain for some time farmers are racing the clock to grow feed to last through the colder months.
Dairy farmers Brian and Debbie Parker live on a property just outside Denman and they're beginning to feel the pinch from a significant lack of rain.
They've been working the farm for 20 years now and currently have 200 head of Jersey and Illawarra cattle. The last time they suffered a really bad drought was in 2006-2007 and they fear it could get really bad again.
"It's very dry. We have not had any decent rain since Cyclone Debbie. We got a couple of inches then and that was March last year."
"We're having to search further afield all of the time to source hay, we'll be down in Victoria soon! We really want to get some decent rain before Autumn ends, that would be the end of May, that's when the feed just doesn't grow because its coming into winter so we've got to get rain before winter," said Brian Parker.
"As soon as we can grow it [feed] we are feeding it off. There is no surplus feed at all. Actually last week I had to buy in my first load of hay - there goes $12,000 for a b-double from Cowra."
That load of hay could be just the beginning, if no substantial rain comes Brian and his wife Debbie could be shelling out thousands of dollars every month for one b-double load, at least. That will add to an ever increasing power bill and pumping water through irrigation systems more and more.
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In 2015, the government took drought declarations away replacing them with the NSW Drought Strategy. The drought declarations did trigger the release of some subsidies when it was in place including transport subsidies which is something farmers are really missing.
It's understood that now instead of being declared in a drought and assistance being triggered that way, farmers have to get in touch with Local Land Services for help, and if they don't then they won't know about it.
"As far as I knew we needed to be [drought declared], we've had no support tell us that we can actually access those things so I didn't even know anything about it to tell you the truth. And I'm totally unaware of any of that... I'm very unfamiliar with this new system," said Brian Parker.
"Back under the old system we got freight subsidies and that did really help, I don't even know if that is still available," and Brian said he has never had any contact from Local Land Services or the government at any level to tell him there are options available to him or even where to go to look for them.
"We're too busy looking after everything on the farm, and we just need some advice, even an email in laymens terms - something."
"I'm not one to ask for too much help, but just to be aware of what's out there, and if there is something that I see applicable I'd certainly look into it but I don't see anything that's out there."
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"You just can't control the weather I mean we're in an industry, farming, so we go with the weather and it's tough times now, very tough times, but all you've got to do is look after your mental health too," which Brian Parker says from experience, having had trouble a couple of years ago.
"It's the constant work and the stress of it all really and that's what takes its toll on you. And you just wonder when its going to rain next, you keep looking towards the sky."
