January update

Thanks to support from John Deere, Kondinin Group has engaged Dr David Stephens from Agrometeorology Australia to produce these maps for Kondinin Group members for those who are summer cropping and in preparation for the 2020 winter cropping program.

The maps produced as close to real-time after rainfall is recorded at more than 1000 real-time rain stations across the country.

Commentary

The patchy, though marked improvement in soil moisture in the north eastern wheatbelt in Queensland and much of New South Wales is highlighted. In these parts some summer crops have been sown to make the most of the recently available moisture.

There is also a strip from the central north of South Australia down to Melbourne that also has good reserves at depth.

For the rest of the wheatbelt the amount of soil moisture is low as the rain that has fallen over the last few months has generally been of smaller amounts that have evaporated in hot weather.

Western Australia received good falls in the northern part of the wheatbelt just two days after these maps were generated, so observations of improvement will be visible in the next soil moisture map installment prior to the start of seeding.

These maps will be updated monthly thanks to continued support from John Deere.

PDF:  February 2020 Plant available soil moisture