Dream start for Pilton Valley farmers

The unusually high amount of winter rain has given crops like barley, wheat and oats a strong start, but it also means growers are facing a wait of up to two weeks until they can get spray rigs on paddocks.

Pilton Valley crop and cattle producers the Ryan family, who normally receive 650 millimetres of rain annually, have already recorded 425mm.

Michael Ryan, who farms with fiancee Alyson Hackett and his parents Mary and John, said it was a welcome outlook after years of drought.

"It's the best season we've had since 2016," Mr Ryan said.

"We haven't had a decent season since. The Pilton Valley is a good area for rain normally but the last few years it's been shocking. We've been missing rain but it'll be raining over at Clifton."

Mr Ryan planted barley and wheat in May and June into a full moisture profile, with 50mm of in-crop rain already falling.

"I reckon it's the best planting we've seen in the last 10 years - conditions-wise," he said.

"The ground was just perfect with a full profile under it. Even our country going into early sorghum will have a full profile. We received beautiful rain in March; you couldn't ask for better rain. It was nice rain over a few weeks, but it was a month too late. If we got it in February it would've really benefited our early sorghum.

"Even though some of our early sorghum is still going six tonnes to the hectare, if it got that extra rain in February it would've been seven-and-a-half tonnes plus.

"We planted the late sorghum in the middle of January, then it went all of February and didn't get one bit of rain, then we had all that rain in March and it was just a bit too late. Anyway, it set us up for the winter crop. The season's been good ever since it started raining in March."

Mr Ryan said he still had some late-planted sorghum to harvest but the rain had delayed his plans.

"There'd be a couple of hundred hectares of late sorghum to come off but it's been raining every week, so every time you're about to pull the header out it starts raining. It's still standing really well though."

Mr Ryan planted feed barley varieties Rosalind, Oxford and Beast, wheat variety Lancer, and Wizard forage oats earlier in the year.

He said they choose high protein barley varieties which are suited to feedlots.

"We don't try to grow low protein, which is for malting. We always try to grow high protein, high yield," he said.

"These days there's not much difference.

"All our wheat (last season) was Australian Prime Hard one and most of it went into chickens as feed wheat. It was all top quality wheat.

"Some of it was too good they said, with protein levels over 15pc, which is a bit too high for milling.

"So you're better off aiming for yield."

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The family started dairy farming in the area in the 1940s but are now producers of grain sorghum, corn, soybeans and mungbeans in summer and wheat, barley and chickpeas in winter across dryland and irrigated paddocks.

They also buy weaners and store cattle to grow out and fatten on their licensed feedlot.

Their Pilton properties include Glentonvale and Alfred Park and they share farm country with outside parties.

In addition to the promising winter crop outlook, the family are also excited about their new farm Greenfields which they purchased from a local family in March.

"Dad bought some, I bought some and they've kept some of it for themselves, but I'm going to farm that for them now. They're retiring so we were lucky that we got a chance to buy some. It was right next door."

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