Labour Day’s St Andrew’s Church fair was another victim of one of the soggiest years on record. Photo – Michael Jeans.
Cambridge people have good reason to be fed up with the rain, with 2017 shaping up to be one of the wettest years on record.
Waikato Regional Council water science team leader Bevan Jenkins said Ruakura was the closest long-term rainfall monitoring station to Cambridge and gave a representative picture of the weather here.
“Rainfall at Ruakura for 2017 until the end of October was 1366mm, which means rainfall is already well ahead of the 1170mm annual average – and there are still two months left in the year,” he said.
“If we got average rainfall in November and December, 2017 would end up being the fourth wettest year since records began at Ruakura in 1907.”
A professional Cambridge counsellor, who was happy to speak anonymously, said the incessant rain was “definitely affecting people”.
“Clients are commenting on how sick they are of the rain,” she said.
“And when there’s not a lot of sunshine and people aren’t getting outside as much they’re not getting as much vitamin D so that affects their health. I think people are more housebound – particularly elderly people who don’t want to be out battling the elements – and if they do go out it’s more of a hassle because it’s wet.
“Some people are starting to move into the lower end of depression and that’s affecting their families and rippling out into work situations.”
She said the impact on farmers had been particularly noticeable.
Roto-o-Rangi dairy farmer Marc Gascoigne, who has recently become a facilitator for the Rural Support Trust, said constant rain through winter and spring had been “horrible” for farmers.
“The rain was just relentless and there was never more than a few dry days to let the ground recover,” he said.
Mr Gascoigne encouraged farmers to seek help from the Rural Support Trust if they needed it. Visit www.rural-support.org.nz or call 0800 787 254.
