Farmers anxious for early May rain

A wet start to the year has set the platform for a good winter cropping season for Queensland farmers, with most areas seeing 200mm to 300mm in the first three months of 2020. But the fickle weather patterns have suddenly turned dry again in April.

Most of the Central Queensland and Southern Queensland cropping areas saw little to no rain during April. CQ farmers received less than 5mm for the month. Mung bean crops planted on the summer rain are going backwards, with farmers now pessimist that once promising crops will turn a profit.

Some farmers in CQ are already looking ahead to summer crops, such as sorghum, without some decent falls in the coming weeks.

It's a similar situation across the central and western Darling Downs were farmers are desperate for 30mm to 40mm of rain to plant. Cracks are starting to develop again in the black soils of the Darling Downs with Dalby and Miles both receiving less than 5mm in April.

Near term weather forecasts offer no immediate relief for Queensland farmers although the medium-term outlook remains promising.

In its latest seasonal outlook released late last week, the Bureau of Meteorology said early May is looking drier than average, but the chances of rain improve beyond this. May to July overall is likely to be wetter than average for most of the southern two-thirds of Australia. However, parts of the tropical north, and areas east of the Great Dividing Range have roughly equal chances of being wetter or drier than average, the Bureau said.

Domestic grain markets moved sharply lower last week in a mix of weakness in global prices on improving weather as well as general planting rains across NSW, Victorian and South Australia weighed on local prices.

Old crop ASX east coast wheat futures tumbled $28 to $364 a tonne while new crop futures for a January delivery lost $22 to $310 a tonne.

Dry weather concerns offered support to the Queensland grain prices. Nearby stockfeed wheat delivered into the Darling Downs fell $15 to $455 with barley also dropping $15 to $380. New crop stockfeed wheat for a November / December delivery fell $17 to $323 a tonne while barley was unchanged at $290 a tonne.