Australia Weather News
Good rain has meant water allocations have gone up, although some farmers want a reprieve to allow crops to dry out. - ABC
South Australian River Murray irrigators have seen their second water allocation increase within a month.
Widespread winter rainfall has allowed the State Government to increase the allocation from 52 per cent to 89 per cent.
Recently, some of South Australia's water stored under its Storage Right started to spill from Lake Victoria, New South Wales.
As a result, this spill has been re-regulated and allocated to Adelaide and associated country areas, freeing up about 9 per cent of the additional amount of water to be re-allocated to irrigation and other uses.
CEO of the Central Irrigation Trust Gavin McMahon said the decision had been welcomed by irrigators.
"It's quite a significant rise in the last few weeks, can I say not unexpected and very welcome," Mr McMahon said.
"I think right across the catchment there's a fair a bit of optimism, we had our National Irrigators Council meeting recently and it's very wet in virtually all the catchments, that gives good soil moisture profiles for all of those irrigators and dry-land croppers up there," Mr McMahon said.
"If you've got a good soil moisture profile then your reliance on irrigation water is less and if you're not an irrigator it's really good to go into a cropping season with a full moisture profile."
Some farmers on South Australia's Lower Eyre Peninsula have actually been hoping rain holds off, at least until some crops dry out.
Cummins agronomist George Pedler said waterlogging was threatening crops, which effectively drowned when there was too much rain.
He said in 2014 crops were destroyed in what was called a "wet drought", which farmers are hoping will not happen this year.
"Last week crops did improve with the longer days and a bit of sunshine on them, but unfortunately we just keep on getting reasonably strong fronts even when they're not forecast so we're getting showers that aren't too good for us," Mr Pedler said.
But while some parts of the Eyre Peninsula did not want more rain at the moment, the region was largely benefitting.
Cowell farmer Mark Deer said the outlook was promising.
"It would be in the top probably 30 per cent of promising years; it's got potential to be a well-above-average year if we get a kind finish," he said.
Kimba farmer John Schaefer said the season was shaping up well.
"It's pretty nice, in a low rainfall area it can always be better, but relatively speaking compared to other years I'm pretty happy at how we're set up," he said.
As a result, South Australia's grain crop is estimated to be an above average 7.2 million tonnes in the 2016–17 season, according to the latest Crop and Pasture Report.
Primary Industries and Regions SA's (PIRSA) report indicated rainfall for both May and June was average to above average in the state's cereal zone.
If the current rainfall patterns continue for the rest of the growing season this estimate will make this the eighth consecutive crop above the long-term (ten-year) average production of 6.9 million tonnes.
The wheat crop area has remained stable at around 2.2 million hectares; however, barley has been reduced in many districts resulting in this year's barley crop being the smallest area in more than 17 years, because of the low price outlook.
The area sown to lentils has increased to a record high, especially on the Yorke Peninsula.
ABC