Rain to hit grain crops, slows harvest in Victoria and Riverina

A deluge of rain over the next three days is threatening the grain harvest — once again.

Persistent rain across the Victorian and southern NSW grain belt is frustrating nervous farmers hoping to get their crops harvested before storms potentially downgrade them.

Already, harvesting across many districts is two weeks behind schedule after a cool finish to the season, a lack of hot days to ripen crops and intermittent days of rain in recent weeks causing delays.

Grain growers in northeast Victoria and the Riverina are bracing themselves against a forecast deluge of 40-80mm of rain over the next three days.

Widespread rain is forecast across Victoria.

Victorian Farmers Federation grains group president and Rutherglen farmer Ashley Fraser said rain forecasts had been wildly inaccurate and he was hoping the Bureau of Meteorology might have got it wrong again.

“We were expecting 40mm of rain last Friday but we got nothing,” Mr Fraser said.

“The crops in northeast Victoria and the Riverina are looking fantastic.

“We are holding our breath that we can get them off.”

Crops in the Wimmera look good, but rain threatens. Picture: Supplied

Mr Fraser said high moisture content had prevented local barley crops from being harvested.

He said canola pods were brittle and farmers were worried a heavy thunder storm or hailstorm would cause widespread damage.

“We particularly want to get the canola crops off because they are worth so much,” he said.

Chris Kelly, of Kelly Grains, at Finley in NSW, said 70mm of rain was forecast for the Riverina over three days from tonight.

Mr Kelly said it had been a stop-start harvest so far, with only about 20 per cent of the canola crop harvested.

He said wheat and barley crops not quite ready for harvesting.

Birchip Cropping Group chairman John Ferrier was frantically harvesting his family’s lentil crops before rain came.

Mr Ferrier said the weather had been “challenging”, particularly for those trying to harvest barley.

“We had started harvesting barley but pulled out because it was hard to get moisture down enough to make deliveries,” he said.

“We haven’t been getting enough hot days.”

Mr Ferrier said they had direct headed their canola crops.

“We didn’t have a lot in but the yield and quality were really good and the oil was good,” he said.

“Our lentils are yielding very well at more than two tonnes a hectare.

“A lot of people are harvesting their lentils because the moisture levels are not a problem.”

Mr Ferrier said crops north of Birchip towards Swan Hill had missed out on some crucial spring rains and yields had suffered.

Wimmera and central Victorian crops had benefited from late spring rains and were looking good.

GrainCorp has reported deliveries of only 72,900 tonnes in Victoria last week, taking total deliveries to 88,400 tonnes.

Nearly 1.2 million tonnes were delivered to GrainCorp’s NSW storage network last week, mostly in the north, while Queensland storages received 143,000 tonnes.