'WHAT temperatures have you had this past week?" I ask the Bertallis, of Coomealah, north of Mildura.

"Would that be tourist temperatures or farmer temperatures?" was Judy and Richard's reply, laughing and suggesting their old Fowler's thermometer on their back veranda only dealt in farmer temperatures - in other words, the real thing.

So Richard, a diligent keeper of records reads through the days: 38C on November 8, 39C on the ninth, 40C on the 10th, 41C on the 11th, 39C on the 12th, 41C on the 13th, 41C on the 14th and 43C on the 15th.

It's about 9am on Monday and they've come in from their 35ha citrus orchard for a quick drink between spraying and watering to try to keep their navel orange trees going through the heat.

"We've been sitting on the tractor listening to the wireless," says Judy, 60, "and they've been telling us it's not a heatwave, not until it gets to 40 in the day and 30 at night."

They're amused by officialdom's declaration of what's a heatwave and what's not.

In any case, it's been 10C hotter than it normally is at this time of year.

Heat has knocked the fruit at setting stage twice and April's crop is likely to be halved.

How are they adapting to the heat?

They start work at daybreak, then go inside around 11am, for a shower "and a camp".

They stay inside until about 7pm and then it's back out to work until dark.

At Chinkapook, south of Manangatang, in the Mallee, the temperature's been hovering around 40C all week and Maree Ryan is grateful for the verandas.

The grain harvest, along with the heat, has started early and is in full swing, so she doubles the water, ice, drinks and juices she loads into the men's lunch packs for their days in the paddocks.

"I close the blinds and cope as our grandmothers coped," says Maree.

She does the washing and cooking in the cool of the evening, hanging out the clothes to dry overnight.

On Monday morning she was due at a meeting in Robinvale where women, many of whom are left at home alone or with young children while their husbands are away harvesting, will learn what to do in the event of fire.

At Trentham Cliffs, on the Murray River bank north of Mildura, dried fruit, wine and table grape vine nursery owner Paula Gordon says she's used to the heat, though not this early.

The heat's good for growing and ripening the vines, she says, and the birds like it.

"It means we do all our work faster and earlier, starting around 6.30am."

Julie Mansell says the work crew on her orchard at Colignan started earlier over the past week.

The navel picking is just about finished.

One day the temperature was 45C in the shade.

If they need, they'll start work at 7am or 6am and knock off earlier.

A week like the one just gone has those of us who believe the climate is changing nodding our heads in affirmation and saying extreme temperatures like this will become more permanent.

But many farmers belong to the other faith, the one that says this is drought. Still!

"I still reckon it's a drought," says Richard Bertalli, "and it will break in the next 18 months."

Climate change or not, Maree Ryan says even the old farmers in her area are asking if it's this hot now, what's it going to be like come February?