Australian Export Grain Innovation Centre maps show Victorian wheat yield slipping

A NEW wheat yield forecast shows Victoria is slipping behind other states, as growers wait for rain.

The Daily Telegraph. Paddock to the plate, local wheat farmer Neil Unger attempts to break Guinness world record for baking bread straight after taking it from the paddock in Parkes. The wheat in the paddock before it was harvested.

A NEW wheat yield forecast shows Victoria is slipping behind other states, as growers in major grain regions continue to wait for substantial rainfall.

The latest yield-ranking maps from the Australian Export Grain Innovation Centre, released last week, predicted most of Victoria had only a 10 to 50 per cent chance of achieving average yields.

AEGIC senior research officer David Stephens said yield predictions in Victoria were sliding below average.

“There might have been enough rain to keep crops growing, but we’re getting to the point where yield penalties (factors affecting yield such as heat and moisture) are kicking in,” Dr Stephens said.

Dr Stephens said crops in Victoria were planted with lower levels of soil moisture than in South Australia or Western Australia.

However, he said there were some opportunities for early sowing, which had helped the percentile rankings.

At Nhill in the Wimmera, sheep feed supplies are drastically low.

Nhill Merino stud operator and VFF livestock committee member Robert Harding said the dry conditions were increasingly worrying in the Wimmera.

“We are in desperate need of rain, there is no sheep feed,” Mr Harding said.

NAB Agribusiness general manager Khan Horne said crop production this year could have “variable outcomes” after the bank downgraded the Victorian wheat crop estimate by 23 per cent on its June forecast.

Mr Horne said the next month was critical.

“Rainfall in late August and September this year will be a fundamental game maker or breaker,” he said.

Landmark agronomist Greg Toomey, at Elmore, said soil moisture levels were low, which would become a problem if not topped up in spring.

The Victorian Government reported a decrease in soil moisture at its Werrimull soil moisture probe in the Mallee, as a result of the developing crop’s water requirements.

There has, however, been an increase in soil moisture at Raywood in central Victoria and Hamilton in the Western District, while the rest of the state has been steady but generally drier than normal.