A drought may be declared in Otago and Southland within days.
Photo: RNZ / Ian Telfer Record heat and prolonged dry conditions have been hitting farmers hard.
Federated Farmers representative in Central Otago, Andrew Paterson, said he expected an official drought to be also called for Central Otago and Southland within the next week.
It had received only 290mm of rain, when the average was 500mm, he said.
Water was getting scarce.
Photo: RNZ / Ian Telfer Irrigation has already been halved in the area and was heading towards 25 percent or a complete stop.
His farm had little grass and it had had to offload thousands of lambs and cattle that it would normally fatten first – even stock water was getting low.
Not only that but the extreme heat was taking its toll too.
Photo: RNZ / Ian Telfer "Since we started tailing, which was last week in November, the heat just hasn’t let up," he said.
Farmers needed more support, said Mr Paterson.

Farming’s blame merchants should get off the soapbox and work with farmers.
Usually I wouldn’t pay this lot much attention as they consist of tired old dinosaurs, Fish & Game, the Environmental Defence Society and Massey University lecturer Dr Russell Death.
While intensive agriculture does have some negative impacts on our environment, most farmers and farming organisations have now recognised and accepted the science around this and have made substantial investments and improvements to remedy downstream problems.
* Te Aroha dairy farmer takes over reins as Waikato Federated Farmers president * Waikato Federated Farmers president stepping down after three years * Dairy farmers at the helm of Taranaki Federated Farmers * Federated Farmers hopes to boost numbers by recruiting young farmers Where is the admission from the board of Tourism New Zealand of the damage to the environment wreaked by millions of visitors, especially the pollution from "freedom campers"?
On walks along several of our local mountain tracks, I am disgusted to find human waste, paper and glass strewn around our native bush, rivers and streams.
Fish & Game shouldn’t throw stones, not until they can articulate their policies around protecting New Zealand waterways from wildfowl E. coli, and how they are protecting native fish stocks from their invasive predatory game fish.
And I guess the Massey University social experiment continues, with the hypothesis being that if we as a country can decimate around 30-40 per cent of our GDP through eliminating our world-class agricultural industry, somehow our standard of living will not only remain stable but could somehow improve.
Good luck with that.
While agriculture has had impacts on our water quality over the years, the main difference between agriculture and these other players is that we in the primary production sectors acknowledge and believe we have a real part to play in pursuing solutions and improving the quality of our waterways.
Bold claims I know, but where is this level of solution and commitment from Fish & Game, Massey University and New Zealand Tourism?