00:02After weeks of seeding on Scott Crosby's place at Niobing,
00:08preparations are underway to sow the final paddock of wheat.
00:12He's planted 7,000 hectares dry seeding well before the traditional Anzac Day start.
00:19So we're just changing what we're doing and although it mightn't have rained,
00:23you know, because we don't know where it's going to rain,
00:25it's there ready for the rain to go and if it's rained it'll come up.
00:29It's a shift happening across the grain belt,
00:32in part because late autumn is trending drier,
00:36a pattern researchers have tracked.
00:38Certainly from the late 1980s projections have been indicating
00:43for the south-west region cool season climate to decrease as part of global warming,
00:47so it's consistent with that.
00:48This year WA Grows have planted more than 9 million hectares of crop,
00:53using new varieties and efficient technologies to use every drop of rain.
00:59Improve the soils, make them more vibrant and probably a lot more we use,
01:03a lot more trace elements than we did in the past.
01:05All those little one percenters have added up to get the system okay.
01:10A train of fronts across the south-west forecast for this week and across the weekend
01:15will deliver a promising start to winter.
01:19If we can get 10 mils in the next seven days well that'll be great,
01:24if we can get 20 mils it'll be fantastic,
01:26if we get 30 or 40 mils it'll be awesome.
01:28From July onwards there appears to be an emerging drier signal coming out of the models,
01:33there's a range of things going on in the Pacific and potentially Indian Ocean
01:36that might be contributing to this.
01:38In the meantime, this week's forecast is delivering hope.
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