Rural
18 March, 2025
Flooded with stress
A SUNSHINE Coast local has shared her traumatic experience in Woodford, when her cattle property flooded due to Tropical Cyclone Alfred (TCA), resulting in her and her husband’s small business losing nearly $40,000 to $50,000 worth of cattle.
Melanie Colquhoun and her husband, Nic, had taken every precaution to prepare for TCA to ensure their 35 heads of cattle were safe during potential floods, as they knew the property was in a flood zone.
This included moving them to the second highest paddock, in preparation of moving them to the highest block once the rain started.
Despite their preparation, when they went to move the bulls and steers to the high paddock on Monday (March 10) at 6am, they found 17 of them had swum back across the property dam, which had already flooded above the fence line, to the paddock that had already started to flood and was now cut off.
“Everything had already been cut off to get them back to the high paddock, so we had to try and get them through the back paddocks, which were already knee deep in flood water,” she said.
The best way to get them around the back to the highest paddock was by cutting the fenceline along a TMR easement and push them along the outside fence, which borders the D’Aguilar Highway, as the inside gates of the back paddocks were already underwater.
“We were stopping and slowing down traffic as we moved them, but, because it was not what they were used to, three quarters of the way up to the higher paddock, they broke off,” she said.
“I managed to get them all into a corner, and eleven went into the paddock, but six ran back down along the highway and into the TMR easement.”
The six that broke off, went back into the flooded part of the property and decided to swim back across the dam to the paddock that was now waist-deep underwater.
However, one bull got caught on the barbed wire fence submerged in the dam.
“My husband had some nips and went into the fast-moving flood water to cut the bull loose, who was bobbing his head in and out of the water. Coming out of the water he had a baby red belly in his boot, just to top it off.”
Eventually, with help of the neighbour, and following herd instincts, the cattle decided to swim back to the dry paddock, where the remainder were.
The entire ordeal took roughly five hours, with no cattle being lost.
Melanie admitted she felt very “overwhelmed” and “frustrated” reading online posts over the weekend and the following days of people claiming TCA was a non-event and poking fun of how people ‘overprepared’.
“I think there needs to be some humour in situations that are stressful, but they hadn’t experienced the stress and I just felt frustrated reading people call it a ‘non-event’,” she said.
“It was an event and you were just lucky enough to be blissfully unaware of it.”
Melanie and Nic, who run a small Droughtmaster Stud business, were looking at potentially losing over $40,000 in cattle if those 17 hadn’t been saved.
Aside from profit, Melanie acknowledged the emotional impact of losing that cattle would also have taken a toll, as they “have great connection with the cattle” and “know each one their personalities.”
After posting about her experience on various social media groups, Melanie said the feedback she received from the community was “amazing.”
“People became more aware of the stress that goes with the uncertainty of these events for primary producers,” she said.
“We almost lost most of our stock. You turn that into a station that floods and see what happens to prices.”
