Sheep and beef farmers are being urged to put a dry-weather plan on paper before the paddocks start browning off, with Beef + Lamb New Zealand releasing recordings of a three-part El Niño webinar series on Monday.

The sessions, organised alongside MPI's on-farm support staff and a Whanganui catchment collective, cover the seasonal outlook, early decision-making and lessons from farmers who have been through long dry spells.

Laura Davis, a regional extension manager at B+LNZ, said the planning for a dry spell had to begin "well before the rain stops".

The timing matters for Southland. The province came out of a saturated winter and spring, but forecasters say the drying phase of El Niño is now building. Writing in Farmers Weekly on 1 November, weather analyst Philip Duncan said Australia's Bureau of Meteorology expects the pattern to peak in November and December and to hang around through summer and into autumn.

Mr Duncan said New Zealand was holding up reasonably well for late spring but soil moisture was falling. Northland is drying fastest, with rainfall around Whangārei more than 50mm below normal, while the eastern South Island has so far gone the other way: Otago, Canterbury and the Marlborough east coast were 20 to 40mm wetter than usual in the fortnight to 27 October, with West Coast rain spilling east into Southland. The Catlins were near normal or a little drier.

He expects a large high to sit east of the country this week, dragging warm north-westerlies and more West Coast rain across the South Island, with the next cold south-westerly change likely next week.

In the first webinar, climate scientist Chris Brandolino outlines what El Niño could mean this season: warmer temperatures, below-normal rain in some regions, a higher fire risk and a good deal of remaining uncertainty.

The second session, from farm consultant Rob McNab, is the practical one. His advice is to write the plan down, complete feed budgets, set trigger points that force a decision, keep the farm team and advisers in the loop, and make calls early rather than under pressure once feed has run out.

East Coast farmer Simon Hales closes the series with lessons from his own droughts: budget feed honestly, protect breeding stock first, act early, be realistic about how much feed is really in front of the stock, and look after yourself and your family.

B+LNZ has gathered its drought material, including advice on pushing feed forward into summer, in the adverse events section of its knowledge hub, and farmers can contact its regional extension teams for help.