If a rain 'depression' can send lots and lots of rain, what is a prolonged drought? A boom or just a dry arguement?
What is a drought?
- Thread starter Brenda Irwin
- Start date
"If rain don't come this week" said Dan,
And cleared his throat to speak,
"We'll all be rooned" said Hanrahan,
"If rain don't come this week".
Looking like rain tonight in Northern and Central NSW. Here's hopeing. My wheat would love a drink.
See ya's.
And cleared his throat to speak,
"We'll all be rooned" said Hanrahan,
"If rain don't come this week".
Looking like rain tonight in Northern and Central NSW. Here's hopeing. My wheat would love a drink.
See ya's.
Worthy of quoting in full
SAID HANRAHAN by John O’Brien
“We’ll all be rooned,” said Hanrahan,
In accents most forlorn,
Outside the church, ere Mass began,
One frosty Sunday morn.
The congregation stood about,
Coat-collars to the ears,
And talked of stock, and crops, and drought,
As it had done for years.
“It’s looking crook,” said Daniel Croke;
“Bedad, it’s cruke, me lad,
For never since the banks went broke
Has seasons been so bad.”
“It’s dry, all right,” said young O’Neil,
With which astute remark
He squatted down upon his heel
And chewed a piece of bark.
And so around the chorus ran
“It’s keepin’ dry, no doubt.”
“We’ll all be rooned,” said Hanrahan,
“Before the year is out.”
“The crops are done; ye’ll have your work
To save one bag of grain;
From here way out to Back-o’-Bourke
They’re singin’ out for rain.
“They’re singin’ out for rain,” he said,
“And all the tanks are dry.”
The congregation scratched its head,
And gazed around the sky.
“There won’t be grass, in any case,
Enough to feed an ***;
There’s not a blade on Casey’s place
As I came down to Mass.”
“If rain don’t come this month,” said Dan,
And cleared his throat to speak -
“We’ll all be rooned,” said Hanrahan,
“If rain don’t come this week.”
A heavy silence seemed to steal
On all at this remark;
And each man squatted on his heel,
And chewed a piece of bark.
“We want an inch of rain, we do,”
O’Neil observed at last;
But Croke “maintained” we wanted two
To put the danger past.
“If we don’t get three inches, man,
Or four to break this drought,
We’ll all be rooned,” said Hanrahan,
“Before the year is out.”
In God’s good time down came the rain;
And all the afternoon
On iron roof and window-pane
It drummed a homely tune.
And through the night it pattered still,
And lightsome, gladsome elves
On dripping spout and window-sill
Kept talking to themselves.
It pelted, pelted all day long,
A-singing at its work,
Till every heart took up the song
Way out to Back-o’-Bourke.
And every creek a banker ran,
And dams filled overtop;
“We’ll all be rooned,” said Hanrahan,
“If this rain doesn’t stop.”
And stop it did, in God’s good time;
And spring came in to fold
A mantle o’er the hills sublime
Of green and pink and gold.
And days went by on dancing feet,
With harvest-hopes immense,
And laughing eyes beheld the wheat
Nid-nodding o’er the fence.
And, oh, the smiles on every face,
As happy lad and lass
Through grass knee-deep on Casey’s place
Went riding down to Mass.
While round the church in clothes genteel
Discoursed the men of mark,
And each man squatted on his heel,
And chewed his piece of bark.
“There’ll be bush-fires for sure, me man,
There will, without a doubt;
We’ll all be rooned,” said Hanrahan,
“Before the year is out.”
“We’ll all be rooned,” said Hanrahan,
In accents most forlorn,
Outside the church, ere Mass began,
One frosty Sunday morn.
The congregation stood about,
Coat-collars to the ears,
And talked of stock, and crops, and drought,
As it had done for years.
“It’s looking crook,” said Daniel Croke;
“Bedad, it’s cruke, me lad,
For never since the banks went broke
Has seasons been so bad.”
“It’s dry, all right,” said young O’Neil,
With which astute remark
He squatted down upon his heel
And chewed a piece of bark.
And so around the chorus ran
“It’s keepin’ dry, no doubt.”
“We’ll all be rooned,” said Hanrahan,
“Before the year is out.”
“The crops are done; ye’ll have your work
To save one bag of grain;
From here way out to Back-o’-Bourke
They’re singin’ out for rain.
“They’re singin’ out for rain,” he said,
“And all the tanks are dry.”
The congregation scratched its head,
And gazed around the sky.
“There won’t be grass, in any case,
Enough to feed an ***;
There’s not a blade on Casey’s place
As I came down to Mass.”
“If rain don’t come this month,” said Dan,
And cleared his throat to speak -
“We’ll all be rooned,” said Hanrahan,
“If rain don’t come this week.”
A heavy silence seemed to steal
On all at this remark;
And each man squatted on his heel,
And chewed a piece of bark.
“We want an inch of rain, we do,”
O’Neil observed at last;
But Croke “maintained” we wanted two
To put the danger past.
“If we don’t get three inches, man,
Or four to break this drought,
We’ll all be rooned,” said Hanrahan,
“Before the year is out.”
In God’s good time down came the rain;
And all the afternoon
On iron roof and window-pane
It drummed a homely tune.
And through the night it pattered still,
And lightsome, gladsome elves
On dripping spout and window-sill
Kept talking to themselves.
It pelted, pelted all day long,
A-singing at its work,
Till every heart took up the song
Way out to Back-o’-Bourke.
And every creek a banker ran,
And dams filled overtop;
“We’ll all be rooned,” said Hanrahan,
“If this rain doesn’t stop.”
And stop it did, in God’s good time;
And spring came in to fold
A mantle o’er the hills sublime
Of green and pink and gold.
And days went by on dancing feet,
With harvest-hopes immense,
And laughing eyes beheld the wheat
Nid-nodding o’er the fence.
And, oh, the smiles on every face,
As happy lad and lass
Through grass knee-deep on Casey’s place
Went riding down to Mass.
While round the church in clothes genteel
Discoursed the men of mark,
And each man squatted on his heel,
And chewed his piece of bark.
“There’ll be bush-fires for sure, me man,
There will, without a doubt;
We’ll all be rooned,” said Hanrahan,
“Before the year is out.”
LOL, Thanks Duncan, that is a classic.
a drought is when the Fed Govt gives farmers a free handout.....
despite metro businesses gettin nothin when they go through hard times....
and whyso? cos John Howard reckons a farmer with depression is bad for the national identity....
despite metro businesses gettin nothin when they go through hard times....
and whyso? cos John Howard reckons a farmer with depression is bad for the national identity....
A long time between drinks that's a drought!
What determines a drought for me is when I see sad, sorry, poor and weak cattle walk (drop) off the back of a transport truck that has bought them down from some N.S.W property to greener pastors and you see them drop to there knees and drop dead.
That tells me they been in a drought prolonged conditions out of the ordinary with not enough food or water.
Great Droving them and watching them pick up especially when you got 30 new born calves dropping out and up walking beside there mothers within 20 minutes very hardy animals those short horn from up north and they walk like a camel they walk all day.
What determines a drought for me is when I see sad, sorry, poor and weak cattle walk (drop) off the back of a transport truck that has bought them down from some N.S.W property to greener pastors and you see them drop to there knees and drop dead.
That tells me they been in a drought prolonged conditions out of the ordinary with not enough food or water.
Great Droving them and watching them pick up especially when you got 30 new born calves dropping out and up walking beside there mothers within 20 minutes very hardy animals those short horn from up north and they walk like a camel they walk all day.
Does that also apply to IP investors? (Read another SS thread this morning, which said the ATO was going to come down harder on IP investors, because of their increasing amount of tax deductions.) Wouldn't IP investor's who are taxed to the hilt, be depressed, thereby incurring bad PR for the national identity?
My father bought grain at $210 a tone three weeks ago to feed his stock and to buy the same grain off the same fella again today (three weeks later) would cost $300.
Maybe you IP investors are in the wrong bizzo a.t.m should be buying large amounts of grain and storing for capital gain.
This drought is only getting worst. Investors have just had it as good as it's been for 30 years and you are experiencing the cream of the crop. I think it is despicable to hint on or suggest a claim that you might be depressed.
This current drought is predicted to be the worst in 100 years.
Maybe you IP investors are in the wrong bizzo a.t.m should be buying large amounts of grain and storing for capital gain.
This drought is only getting worst. Investors have just had it as good as it's been for 30 years and you are experiencing the cream of the crop. I think it is despicable to hint on or suggest a claim that you might be depressed.
This current drought is predicted to be the worst in 100 years.
That's all right I probably don't understand what the Government is doing to your tax system. I think it's a separate argument that probably can't be compared to the farmers that's all I was thinking.
I guess having been bought up on a dairy farm I tend to stick up for this sort of thing. I know that families get destroyed and lifestyles because of drought and the backbone of this Country are dependent on it. Down the chain a lot of things happen because of a Droubt.
Still what the Government gives them is nothing but a band-aid.
I guess having been bought up on a dairy farm I tend to stick up for this sort of thing. I know that families get destroyed and lifestyles because of drought and the backbone of this Country are dependent on it. Down the chain a lot of things happen because of a Droubt.
Still what the Government gives them is nothing but a band-aid.
Jaffa, recessions come around more often than droughts and adversely effect more small businesses than droughts.... But the government doesn't bail out those businesses. Further, when the govt drops tariff protection and puts a whole sector out of business, or drives it off shore to survive, the govt doesn't go around offering those businesses handouts.
For decades there has been a lot of slack in farming, and many farms are just not viable. Even moreso, if interest was being paid on the land, rather then father handing it down to son for nicks.
Most of my relatives left farming back in the 70s when they realized they had to scale up or get out (sheep, wheat, and beef at Injune and Dalby; and a dairy at Conondale).
I know enough farmers who do really well thankyou, and have made a point to expand their enterprise into areas that traditionally are first to be categorized drought struck, just so they can get the extra handouts and water irrigation rights. I have seen this at Childers and around Gympie in Qld.
Whether farmers like it or not, they have to change their ways and improve productivity, just like every other sector has had to.
Further, farmers are just as free to raise prices for smaller yields in hard times as every other industry does, in an effort to keep the business viable in difficult times. If times are so tough that no crop at all is viable, then there are lots of jobs going in the mines. When in Blackwater and Emerald late last year, I met many farmers who realized they could make better money in the mines for 3-6 months rather then hang around at home.
Incidentally, I was told by an accountant in Emerald that the town has the highest % of millionaires of any town or city in Australia.
In saying this, I am not totally without sympathy for farmers. However, I think that farmers getting special handouts while other small businesses get nothing, should be looked at with less emotion. A lot of small business people lose their house when their business winds up. Many farmers at least get to keep the land they inherited from Mum and Dad.
Finally, I know a lot of farmers that look down their nose at townies....and do not support local town business. And a lot of coastal real estate is owned by farmers.
So I don't buy the Ray Martin 'farmers doin it tough' story.
The govt wasn't offering end consumers compensation to buy bananas at $12/kg several months ago....
For decades there has been a lot of slack in farming, and many farms are just not viable. Even moreso, if interest was being paid on the land, rather then father handing it down to son for nicks.
Most of my relatives left farming back in the 70s when they realized they had to scale up or get out (sheep, wheat, and beef at Injune and Dalby; and a dairy at Conondale).
I know enough farmers who do really well thankyou, and have made a point to expand their enterprise into areas that traditionally are first to be categorized drought struck, just so they can get the extra handouts and water irrigation rights. I have seen this at Childers and around Gympie in Qld.
Whether farmers like it or not, they have to change their ways and improve productivity, just like every other sector has had to.
Further, farmers are just as free to raise prices for smaller yields in hard times as every other industry does, in an effort to keep the business viable in difficult times. If times are so tough that no crop at all is viable, then there are lots of jobs going in the mines. When in Blackwater and Emerald late last year, I met many farmers who realized they could make better money in the mines for 3-6 months rather then hang around at home.
Incidentally, I was told by an accountant in Emerald that the town has the highest % of millionaires of any town or city in Australia.
In saying this, I am not totally without sympathy for farmers. However, I think that farmers getting special handouts while other small businesses get nothing, should be looked at with less emotion. A lot of small business people lose their house when their business winds up. Many farmers at least get to keep the land they inherited from Mum and Dad.
Finally, I know a lot of farmers that look down their nose at townies....and do not support local town business. And a lot of coastal real estate is owned by farmers.
So I don't buy the Ray Martin 'farmers doin it tough' story.
The govt wasn't offering end consumers compensation to buy bananas at $12/kg several months ago....
I store grain all the time. It's not as easy as it sounds. You have to keep the insects out of it. It has to be the right moisture. Some years you can lose, some you win. That last month was like hitting the jackpot, but unfortunately I already had 80% of mine sold.
Farmers going bust and selling out is just how it all happens. Farming should be like any other business. What about all the little corner store businesses that have gone broke in the last 100 years because of Woolworths. What about all the little bakers that closed down when the big national companies took over. You either stay in business, or you don't. Everything is getting more efficient and lean, farming, mining, building, manufacturing, retail, services, everything.
This is a list from the world fact book about numbers of workers employed in farming from a random sample of countries. Percentage employed in agriculture,....
Ethiopia,......... 80%
India,............. 60%
China,............ 49%
Poland,.......... 16.1%
Russia,........... 10.3%
New Zealand,.. 10%
France,.......... 4%
Australia,........ 3.8%
United States,. 1%
The more advanced an economy, basically the less people needed to feed the rest. So here is 80% of Ethiopias workforce working to feed itself, and they are all starving. Australia and the US, hardly any, and they are about the biggest food exporting countries in the world.
Farmers have been going broke and leaving the land for 200 years. 200 years ago most people in Australia were working to feed the whole. 50 years ago 20% of the workforce worked to feed the rest. Today it is less than 4%. In 50 years it will be less still.
Should tax payers give handouts to the bottom rung of farmers so that they stay in business? In reality it will make no difference. It is probably just delaying those farmers from moving on. The top half of farmers will stay in business. I plan on being in the top half. To stay in the top half you have to have enough size and be efficient.
Droughts are a normal part of Australia's weather. There have been other drought events like this one. Funnily enough they happen about every 50 years. There was a big drought in the middle of the 19th century. The federation drought, and the world war 2 drought. Now this one. I am not sure if it is to do with global warming, but lots think it is. If it is to do with global warming, and if farming everywhere will be effected in the rest of the world, then that means that food supplies are going to get tighter. That means food that has been plentifull for 50 years may become more valued. That gets me excited. I want to be in this business if food production is going to become much more important than it has been for the last 50 years. Add China and India. Half a billion new middle class. If grain production drops by 20% world wide, will prices rise by 20%. No, prices will double or triple. Same with any commodity. Economics 101.
One thing is certain. Food will be a lot more expensive in the next 12 months, but maybe the era of cheap food is over for good.
See ya's.
What annoys me about this is Sheep at market are going for heaps less $5 a Sheep for some cases, I remember seems not long ago raving about top dollar and $100 - $120 a Sheep yet that is not changing the Butcher prices at the shelf.
Do the Butchers just experience a good time through this?
Do the Butchers just experience a good time through this?
Hey Jaffa,
I think you will find that a Butchers profit margin may improve a bit.
The main point though is that the cheap sheep that are being offloaded are in poor condition. They are skinny, with little meat and are often older breeding animals. They cost just as much at the abortor to butcher, but have a third the meat, so the butcher is not interested in these animals anyway. Young Fat meaty animals drop in price too, but not by as much. The media only reports about the poor drought stricken animals that are going for $5, the city people hear about this and think it is a rort when it is not.
Probably the ones to profit the most are those that can turn these poor old animals into pet food and stuff, so these people are really doing a service. $5 is better than nothing. It helps cover the cost of going to market and saves the cost of digging a hole and a bullet.
It is not the butchers making a killing.
See ya's.
I think you will find that a Butchers profit margin may improve a bit.
The main point though is that the cheap sheep that are being offloaded are in poor condition. They are skinny, with little meat and are often older breeding animals. They cost just as much at the abortor to butcher, but have a third the meat, so the butcher is not interested in these animals anyway. Young Fat meaty animals drop in price too, but not by as much. The media only reports about the poor drought stricken animals that are going for $5, the city people hear about this and think it is a rort when it is not.
Probably the ones to profit the most are those that can turn these poor old animals into pet food and stuff, so these people are really doing a service. $5 is better than nothing. It helps cover the cost of going to market and saves the cost of digging a hole and a bullet.
It is not the butchers making a killing.
See ya's.
Last edited:
I stuffed up that post
Sorry...........
How do you split someones quotes so that you can reply to each point?
Cheers.
Sorry...........
How do you split someones quotes so that you can reply to each point?
Cheers.
TC, the point I was making regarding city small business risking their home/property and farmers not, is that many current generation farmers have inherited the property and farm business as a going concern. And the land was acquired at very low cost generations ago. Most small city businesses that I know of are not going concerns passed on from father to son, and carry the additional burden of borrowing against PPOR and paying a commercial lease.
If a farm after several generations of operation still has need to be mortgaged to the hilt to stay operational, then I think that's an unviable business the management of which needs to be questioned.
If a farm cannot manage at least a 10% return on capital, in addition to a reasonable wage, then the farmer would be better selling up and investing in urban real estate and share market. That's what my relatives decided in the late 70s and early 80s.
I agree with you that farming is a business....not a romantic lifestyle, and certainly has no right to be a subsidized lifestyle (despite the guilt or misguided romanticism of city slickers).
I also agree wtih you that farming must be rationalized. Let the efficient operators expand and the others find something they are better suited to.
If a farm after several generations of operation still has need to be mortgaged to the hilt to stay operational, then I think that's an unviable business the management of which needs to be questioned.
If a farm cannot manage at least a 10% return on capital, in addition to a reasonable wage, then the farmer would be better selling up and investing in urban real estate and share market. That's what my relatives decided in the late 70s and early 80s.
I agree with you that farming is a business....not a romantic lifestyle, and certainly has no right to be a subsidized lifestyle (despite the guilt or misguided romanticism of city slickers).
I also agree wtih you that farming must be rationalized. Let the efficient operators expand and the others find something they are better suited to.
Hi all,
The vexed question of farmers drought and subsidies.
To all the city people, do you wish to be reliant on overseas cheap produce for your food??
What happens if there is no agriculture here, while we are totally reliant on chinese?/south american? crops, and they have a failure??
The bigger picture that economics 101 overlooks is reliability of food supply. If you prop up the food producers in the bad times, then they will always be around. If you allow them to be destroyed by the bad times, then there is never the safety net of the local produce.
So how should it be??
Let them go out of business permanently or support so that we keep our options open??
My personal opinion is never burn your bridges, but then again I am on the land(and more than likely biased in my opinion).
Mind you I have prepared for the drought and have adequate water supplies for irrigation, but the frost got me .
bye
The vexed question of farmers drought and subsidies.
To all the city people, do you wish to be reliant on overseas cheap produce for your food??
What happens if there is no agriculture here, while we are totally reliant on chinese?/south american? crops, and they have a failure??
The bigger picture that economics 101 overlooks is reliability of food supply. If you prop up the food producers in the bad times, then they will always be around. If you allow them to be destroyed by the bad times, then there is never the safety net of the local produce.
So how should it be??
Let them go out of business permanently or support so that we keep our options open??
My personal opinion is never burn your bridges, but then again I am on the land(and more than likely biased in my opinion).
Mind you I have prepared for the drought and have adequate water supplies for irrigation, but the frost got me
.bye
Sorry to hear about the frost Bill. That is bad news.
The 02 drought gave us a run of record breaking frosts, however none was so out of season to stuff anything. Water pipes were busting up in the ceilings of houses that hadn't busted in eighty years.
We also had big frosts this year, but once again, they weren't out of season.
Hows the wheat crops there Bill. I looked at some wheat farms just north of you in 2001. I was there when the September 11 attacks happened, and watched the whole thing live in a pub in Geelong. That year the crops were terrible as it was a wet time. The crops were all yellow and suffering badly. We only saw one good crop and that was on a big place joining lake Murdeduke. The country was slopping so the crop didn't get waterlogged. The crop was magnificent. Looked like it would go 7 or 8 tonnes to the hectare. They were also running free range pigs.
Good luck.
The 02 drought gave us a run of record breaking frosts, however none was so out of season to stuff anything. Water pipes were busting up in the ceilings of houses that hadn't busted in eighty years.
We also had big frosts this year, but once again, they weren't out of season.
Hows the wheat crops there Bill. I looked at some wheat farms just north of you in 2001. I was there when the September 11 attacks happened, and watched the whole thing live in a pub in Geelong. That year the crops were terrible as it was a wet time. The crops were all yellow and suffering badly. We only saw one good crop and that was on a big place joining lake Murdeduke. The country was slopping so the crop didn't get waterlogged. The crop was magnificent. Looked like it would go 7 or 8 tonnes to the hectare. They were also running free range pigs.
Good luck.
