Canterbury floods wreak havoc on famous farm

The state of emergency in Christchurch has finally been lifted following the recent floods.

What's left behind is a giant mess for one Canterbury farm owner on Banks Peninsula.

An enormous pile of debris, mixed with clay and mud, is stacked up to three metres high on Philip King's property.

The owner of the Louden Farm, best known for Sculpture on the Peninsula, claims it's all come down from a forestry block above his property.

"This is very devastating for us, totally devastating, we have to break fences to get the two diggers in," Mr King said.

"The diggers will be here for months."

The mud slide came down in a torrent after Friday's deluge, taking out his fences.

Some of the logs weigh hundreds of kilos, but at the height of the flood, the torrent was so strong that it picked them up like toothpicks, dragging them for a kilometre.

Further downstream, the debris has dammed what was a pristine waterway.

Once his pride and joy, it now flows along a farm track.

The water reached the window sills of a historic cottage on the farm, leaving behind 10 centimetres of mud.

Mr King's now considering legal action, with the clean-up expected to cost him over $100,000.

The well-known sculptures escaped damage - but the mountain of debris left to clean up amounts to a monument of sorts to the power of Mother Nature.

Newshub.