But when the main dike broke near his land, he could see a wave of water coming toward him. At that point, 240 of the more than 500 cows in his herd had already been moved, so he knew he had to decide quickly.
“When it started to blow, I was in this yard and saw a wave. He said, “It was like, ‘Oomph!’ It’s here. “We’d been on the road all day.”
He moved the calves to the heifer barn, which is on higher ground, with the help of one worker and a couple who had become stuck. Under the barn, water had been collecting, and by the time it was full, it would be several feet deep. He shows the water marks on the side of the barn, with the top line near his shoulder.
By Thursday, November 18, the day after the floods, they were able to get a small jet boat to the farm and start saving the calves. Few at a time were moved to a trailer on the side of the road, where they were then driven to farms in Chilliwack where they were welcomed with open arms. Volunteers and vets were ready with hair dryers and warm towels.
“They were just a few weeks old when they left,” he said. “They were not very big.”
Some of them were very close to dying.
But a year later, those cows that were saved are now having their own calves. On a windy, cold November morning, Phillips was being interviewed in the shelter of the heifer barn about how the town was getting back on its feet after the flood. But the interview was cut short by a familiar farm sound.
A few feet away, one of the cows that had been saved was calmly and quickly giving birth to her own calf.
Graham jumped in and helped pull the calf out of the hole and drag it to its mother’s head, where she started bathing it right away. Graham said that they don’t always need help, but this one was born right up against a stall door, so he wanted to help.
In just a minute or two, the calf was born, and the farmer quickly checked on it.
“It’s a boy,” he said with a huge smile on his face.
Every time a calf is born on a farm, it’s a big deal, but these dairy cows have been through so much already that it’s hard not to see the miracle.
On that day, Graham was not by himself. Farmers all over the Sumas Prairie were doing everything they could to get their animals to safety, even though the RCMP and the BC SPCA had warned them to be careful.
About 200 of Graham’s 500 dairy cows died. In total, 420 cows were lost from the area’s dairy farms. About 23,000 dairy cows live on farms in the area on average.
The floodwaters also killed about 630,000 chickens and 12,000 pigs.
At the height of the flooding, more than 1,100 farms had to evacuate or were on alert, and 150 square kilometres of farmland was flooded. To keep them safe, more than 6,000 dairy cows were moved temporarily to other farms.
On November 8, 2022, a winter wind was blowing over the prairie outside Graham’s heifer barn, and the sun was shining. But when it rains, Graham and other farmers are reminded of the times when it flooded: the planning and worry, the constant watching of the dikes and the Sumas River, the sudden floodwater when the dike broke, and the weeks of cleaning up afterward.
It took a month to clean up the farm so that the Graham dairy herd could go back home, and it took even longer to get the Grahams back home.
Even though Graham hasn’t gotten any money from the Disaster Financial Assistance programme yet, he said that the first wave of volunteer help was what really got them back on their feet and on the road to recovery.
He said that if he had to list them all, it would take pages, but that local churches, a large group of about 50 hunters, and a group of students from Yale secondary were all very helpful.
At one point, there were about 100 volunteers on his farm. He was amazed to see how quickly and well they moved mud and fixed things.
When it rains a lot or when the Sumas River rises to high levels again, he and his neighbours do worry about where the next hole might be.
He said, “We found the weak link.” “But what worries me is everything else.”
Lana Popham, who is the minister of agriculture, went on a tour of some farms in the area on November 8. She told the media that most dairy and poultry farmers are now “back to normal” and that most annual field crops were planted as usual, but the sector is still “keeping its fingers crossed” for better weather this year.
Even though there are new calves, life goes on at the Graham dairy farm.
