Well here we are in the second week of April and on our farm, we’ve had 9mm for this calendar year. I know a good early break is not as critical as it used to be.
In the days of conventional cropping, sowing wouldn’t start until the break and after many hours working up paddocks once weeds had germinated.
Nowadays, it’s different and most of us sow much of the crop dry. The start date for sowing depends more on heat and frost risk in spring rather than rainfall in autumn.
Rain at this time of year can even be a bit of a hindrance and delay the scheduled sowing program!
And yet, I would still like to see something from the sky.
The three inches we received over harvest is hidden in the subsoil and the dry conditions are really showing up with paddocks and tracks starting to blow on windy days.
With so many paddocks sown to pulse crops last year, there are less hectares protected from wind by standing cereal stubbles which has made this worse than it might have been otherwise under our low till growing conditions.
Whilst our BCG weather station is recording well, it can’t make it rain or predict the next downpour.
The Fast Break newsletter from February shows us that at this time of year, the climate models aren’t making any predictions for the next few months’ rainfall.
“Models are mostly sitting on the fence for oceanic and rainfall predictions in the next one to six months, which is common in this lower predictability time of the year” the newsletter states.
So, what is a parched farmer to do over Easter?
Check the CliMate app of course to see how often Berriwillock has received less than 10 mm in the first three months of the year.
Turns out it is more often than I expected, about 9% of the time in the last 69 years. Which made me feel better. A decile 1 year so far but not unheard of!
In 1964 (395mm), 1965 (315mm), 1980 (276mm), 1985 (235mm), 1997 (202mm) and now 2018 Berriwillock has received less than 10mm before April, not to mention 1967 (132mm) and 1986 (326mm) when we received just 10mm.
With the total annual rainfall for each year in brackets, I can see that for all of those years identified, except one, we have received less than our average rainfall.
I’m not convinced this little exercise has really bumped up my flagging spirits, which was my original plan. I even had the article headline sorted (Less than 10mm from Jan-Apr? No biggie). I’ll have to rely on the standard platitudes to feel better.
Thank goodness, our water use efficiency has improved so much in recent decades and we now grow more from every mm and the last couple of seasons have been pretty good.
I’ve been thinking a bit about how we use our weather apps since speaking to Jaclyn Brown from CSIRO a few months back. It is amazing how quickly we have become reliant on having up to date information at our fingertips. Between the two of us, John and I regularly use quite a few weather apps and websites, each one for a slightly different reason.
To name a few, we have Data Farmer for our weather station which shows us what is actually happening out in our front paddock, the OCF is the home page for the computer and the 128km Mildura Radar loop I have added to my home screen on the phone for easy access without a specific app.
None of these many sites however quite provide us with everything we need for a “one stop weather shop” which is why it was great to hear Jaclyn at Trials Review Day in February. She is looking for input on what would need to be included for a weather app specifically designed to meet the needs of us grain farmers. You can contact Jaci or Patrick Mitchell with your thoughts about weather information and what you would have in the perfect app by emailing [email protected] or [email protected].
If we could just get an app that actually makes it rain, then technology would really be user friendly and I wouldn’t have to spend my time looking at unhelpful historical data!
