THE Hepburn brothers will be glad to see the back of this season.
After a promising start, during which John, Raymond and Ross Hepburn sowed 3000ha of wheat and barley around Swan Hill, the crops recovered from a dry pinch last September and then suffered again in the unseasonable early November heatwave.
John estimated yield losses "at about 30 per cent".
"The heat knocked yield around considerably," he said.
Among the last of the crops to be harvested was a paddock of yitpi wheat west of Swan Hill, which the brothers had held over to host a broadacre machinery demonstration day for Ross, who is owner and manager of Hepburn Agri Centre.
Dry sown on May 22, John said part of the paddock yielded 2t/ha, with an average of 1.4t/ha.
The plants showed staining on the leaf and stem, and there had been some downgrading of grain quality in both barley and wheat but John said they had been fortunate the grain hadn't sprouted or sprung from the more than 100mm of rain that delayed harvest by a fortnight.
"The quality's still OK," John said.
"The last few years, because of the dry finishes, we've been getting up to H1 with the higher protein wheats, but anything's a bonus after (last) year."
