DECEMBER, 2018 ISSUE 98
GIPPSLAND REGION
Ron and Vicki Cornall have quit the dairy industry and the stress of East Gippsland’s drought.
Drought stress takes toll JEANETTE SEVERS
THE DAIRY is silent and the cows are sold on Ron and Vicki Cornall’s Clifton Creek farm. Rising two-year-old and one-year-old heifers will be sold in stages over the next year.
The pressure of milking every day for diminishing returns and trying to source enough fodder to balance the production system, is over. This is the outcome of East Gippsland’s threeyear drought. Ron and Vicki Cornall set trigger points for decision-making. But that did not stop the stress
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of wondering: ‘what if the rain comes the day after we sell the milking herd?’. In the end, they received a good price for their herd, sold as a dispersal at Koonwarra saleyards to eager South Gippsland dairy farmers looking for well-bred cows to come straight into their dairies.
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“We milked in the evening, gave them their usual ration, then loaded them onto the truck,” Mr Cornall said. “They were sold the next day and the feedback we’ve received is they were very welcome additions to other farms.”
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