LOCAL farmers anxiously waiting for rain will be buoyed by a positive Bureau of Meteorology outlook for spring, but concerns over lacking sub-soil moisture continue to play on their minds.
The bureau released its seasonal outlook for the next three months yesterday, revealing north-west Victoria was tracking at around a 60 percent probability of reaching its long-term median rainfall for the season, despite the arrival of El Niño.
Birchip Cropping Group assistant agronomic services manager Tim McClelland said for the moment El Niño conditions had been overridden by warm waters in the Indian Ocean, which brought more moist air across Australia.
“So the Bureau’s actually got a forecast for north-western Victoria of a better-than-average spring,” Mr McClelland said.
Mr McClelland said average winter rainfall had left the region’s crops at a level “where they still have potential, but they need to have good strong spring rainfall for that potential to be reached”.
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