After several years enduring extremes of rainfall of either far too much or far too little NSW farmers are looking at forecasts over the next week with some anticipation.
Widespread falls of 15-30mm over much of the state's key cropping areas are likely to germinate dry sown crops and provide an ideal amount of moisture for crop sown after the rain.
The autumn prognosis for other areas is not so good in the short term.
Western Australia remains very dry and while there will be rain in the next week in the state's far south-western corner there is not expected to be significant volumes in the cropping belt.
In southern Australia, Victorian and South Australian croppers have generally good good subsoil moisture but there has been very little rain for the calendar year, apart from patchy falls at the start of April.
Much of the crop has gone in dry, but there is at least a fortnight before meaningful rain is forecast meaning there could be yield penalties incurred due to crops germinating in colder soils and with a shorter growing season.
Tobin Gorey, commodity analyst from The Watchlist, said there were already signs of regional basis differences emerging in the Australian market with the better conditions in the east meaning a lower basis for new crop compared to the west and the south.
He said the market was now paying increasing attention to weather forecasts as they had the potential to materially impact national production which in turn could have an impact on global grain values.
In NSW, Parkes district farmer Bruce Watson was cautiously optimistic about the forecast rain.
"If we get what they forecast, around 20mm, it will be near ideal, but the bulk of the rain is still five days away and a lot can change between now and then," Mr Watson said.
He said there had been some autumn rain in the area which had been sufficient to bring up early sown canola.
The sowing program extends to faba beans this week before moving onto cereals.
"The rain will be perfect for the canola that has just come up and will be enough to bring up the cereals as well, without being so wet that we're going to be stuck off the paddocks for an extended period."
"If we do end up getting what they have said it would be just about ideal, which would be a pleasant change after the last few years where we've either had virtually no rain or floods."