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Grain growers 'saved by the bell' to see phenomenal cropping season
Emma Brown and Nikolai Beilharz, Tuesday December 20, 2016 - 15:52 EDT
Huge cereal and pulse yields almost never happened in Victoria's north west with a phenomenal year only coming at the last minute.
Farmers on social media are touting the 2016 grain crop as the 'best ever' but it was nearly a bust season where a dry Autumn and much of Winter left cereals and pulses withering in the paddock.
Millewa farmer Ron Hards said while prices for grain were not ideal this year's yields had been phenomenal.
He said the additional soil moisture from September's rains would help next year's sowing get off to a strong start.
"At the end of August we almost had crop failure. The crops were starting to wilt and starting to die and they didn't look like they had very much promise at all," he said.
"But it started raining and it didn't stop and it really turned things around.
"It turned one tonne hay crops for instance in to six-tonne hay crops. We were saved by the bell in September."
GrainCorp harvest passes 10m tonnes
GrainCorp said it had now passed the 10 million tonne mark of its harvest, with 2.2 million tonnes harvested in Victoria.
Nigel Lotz from GrainCorp estimated that 60 per cent of the crop had now been harvested across the state, with wheat and barley both flowing in.
"It's been challenging â?? cool mornings, some weather events early on, that's slowed the number of those really big harvest days with big tonnes, but it's starting to ramp up now," he said.
"With wheat the key issue has been quality. There may be a bit more damage in the Mallee from storms that went through a few weeks ago than originally thought, but it's been ok.
"We'll know more as we get fully into it, but it's going ok.
"For barley, early on we definitely had some quality issues there with staining and black tip, but as time goes on there is less concern.
"The big issue really is pricing, a lot of that lower grade is being kept on farm, which I can totally understand."
- ABC
© ABC
2016
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