OUT in the lonesome belah country of far south-western NSW a farm investment group is this year quietly ripping off grain yields that would be the envy of farmers on the Yorke Peninsula or the Liverpool Plains.
The goFARM team at Petro Station, 60 kilometres north-east of Mildura on the way to Lake Mungo are enjoying a season for the ages on the normally ultra-low rainfall property.
The big wet that has caused damage to the east through the Riverina and to the south through Victoria has been just right at the station, with the roughly 500mm of rain so far this year dwarfing the long-term average of 280mm.
It has led to some big yields across the more than 9000 hectares of crop.
Barley has yielded around 4 tonnes to the hectare, lentils 2-2.5t/ha, up to 3t/ha in paddocks and wheat has gone in excess of 4t/ha, with patches yielding a staggering 6t/ha.
But Petro's agronomist Rick Rundell-Gordon, Grounded Agronomy, said that while all were enjoying the year out the box the focus was long-term sustainability.
"Obviously you're not going to have seasons like this in the low rainfall zone too often but we're really happy with what we've been able to do to make the property more sustainable since taking it on," Mr Rundell-Gordon said.
He said the first priority at Petro, one of the few cropping properties in an area dominated by pastoral holdings, was to transform it from a traditional Mallee rotation of long fallow, wheat and pasture rotation to a modern no-till farming system.
"Historically it was that Millewa type northern Victoria wheat-fallow system with cultivation, we've switched over to no-till," he said.
"It's a very easy step and something that is industry standard but this sort of low-hanging fruit has really improved the system."
"Over the years we've had the property we've been working to build up crop residue and organic matter in the soil."
Mr Rundell-Gordon said Petro was on good soil.
"It is not bad dirt at all if you can get the rain, it is classic belah country, with clay loam, it's not too heavy and it doesn't have the sandhills you get elsewhere in the Mallee so there is plenty to work with."
He said as with all Mallee farming systems moisture conservation was critical.
"You look at the rainfall patterns long-term and we're seeing more of our rainfall over the summer months, so we're very disciplined in spraying summer weeds."
Precision agriculture has allowed the Petro team, led by farm manager Tony Cavallero, to control weeds more economically via the use of Weedit spraying technology.
"Getting on top of those tough summer weeds like thistles and fleabane is critical and Weedit allows you to do that without having to put out herbicide over all the paddock, just where the weeds are."
The PA theme continues into the seeding program.
"The entire farm has been mapped, there are seven different zones and we use three of them in our variable rate program, which includes both seed and fertiliser."
"With the cost of inputs rising this is one way to keep costs down and ensure there is adequate nutrition."
He said nutrition rates were generally in step with Mallee averages.
"We're probably targeting that 2, 2.5t/ha of cereals, maybe 3t/ha on the vetch hay stubble, so in a year like this we may well have left some in the bag but it is easy to forget that in winter it was actually quite dry."
Running a high-technology cropping system in a remote area presents its challenges, but the farm has implemented its own connectivity system based on on-farm towers.
While Petro is abuzz with the noise of the X9 John Deere harvester ripping through heavy crops this year it was not always been such smooth sailing for goFarm.
"There have been some tough years since goFARM took over," Mr Rundell-Gordon said.
"The first year there was about 75mm growing season rainfall and the crop didn't come up until September, that was sprayed out and retained as soil cover."
He said with crop residue a high priority the team had been disciplined in not incorporating pulses, generally low residue crops, into the rotation until there was some cereal residue.
Since then Petro has successfully grown lentils, chickpeas and vetch hay.
"Vetch is good, it gets some water and nitrogen for the following year's crop into the system."
Rotationally, normally there is around 50-60pc cereals, and 40-50 break crops such as grain or hay pulses.
Variety wise, Mr Rundell-Gordon said cultivars were chosen for maximum flexibility.
"We grow Scepter wheat, which performs well in the conditions, there is a mixture of barley, including Compass, Commodus, which is a newish Clearfield line and Titan, a new one from AGT that is resistant to quizalofop, that helps us lessen the reliance on the imis."
He said the lentils were generally Hallmark, a Clearfield variety.
Crops are sown on 15 inch (38.1cm row spacings, with a shielded sprayer used to control weeds.
"It is another piece of precision ag we are using that is helping cut inputs and improve sustainability."
Mr Rundell-Gordon said he was optimistic about the future at Petro.
"We're not going to have years like this every time but we've shown that by utilising technology and by working hard to be sustainable we can grow good crops and continue to improve our soils and environment in this region."