Rural service professionals put down their phones and laptops and left the keys in the car last week when they turned out in force to help Strath Taieri farmers clean up from recent flood damage.
The working bee, organised by the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI), was attended by more than 20 rural professionals.
Ministry On Farm Support regional adviser Anna Wilson said the Strath Taieri Valley had experienced a long dry spell of weather, "but when it rains, it pours".
Several farms that border the Taieri River had extensive flood damage, large holes scoured into paddocks and kilometres of damaged fencing.
"These working bees have been arranged in the past and they are a great head start for affected farmers," she said.
Priority was given to farmers who didn’t have staff and needed an extra set of hands, she said.
Strath Taieri farmer Phillip Paul owns 80ha of river flats which he runs trading stock on while working fulltime on a larger station in Kyeburn.
Since buying the land in 2000 he had seen the river flood "10 or so times".
About 3km-4km of fencing had been either pulled away from posts or covered in debris.
"It comes with the territory of farming river flats, but it is always a bit of job to clean up afterwards.
"I just chip away at it over the course of a few months or so.
"Having a day like today really does give me a massive head-start in the cleanup; just having some manpower to get stuck in is really good," he said.
The recent flooding was not the worst he had seen as the rain was not as heavy further inland, "but it is always like the Roaring Meg when it comes through and makes a bit of mess in some places scouring out some big holes in the paddocks".
Mr Paul fences his paddocks in a way that reduces the damage and repair time.
"I secure the wire back to the posts with staples, but I don’t hammer them all the way home, so when another flood comes through, the wire just gets pinged off the posts but the whole fence isn’t washed away.
"It’s not the end of the world, we manage to find a way around it each time and put the stock somewhere.
"I feel for the poor buggers when Gabrielle hit, some of them didn’t have a warm, dry home to go to, and the guys down south that have just had rain event after rain event this year," Mr Paul said.
