PLAYING home to a bizarre collection of huge ice blocks is cold comfort to one orchard-farming family in Victoria's North East.

The ice blocks are the result of a hail storm on New Year's Day on Helmut and Brigitte Linder's farm at Piries, near Mansfield.

The storm, which rolled in about 11pm, lasted for a terrifying 35 minutes but it wasn't until the next day that the Linders discovered the giant ice blocks.

"The hail was 10cm across and flat, almost like a button," Mrs Linder said.

"The storm was that fierce and that loud and it broke the roof on our verandah."

But when they went out to the orchard the next morning to check their fruit, they couldn't believe their eyes.

Mrs Linder estimated the ice balls were about 50cm across, and that was after they had been melting overnight.

"It took my husband about an hour to hose down each ball so it melted," she said.

Despite the massive amounts of ice, the hail nets did their job and the orchard of apples, apricots and peaches went largely undamaged apart from some fruit that fell off through all the associated rain.

The Linders measured 70mm of rain in two days. The nets also survived, with just some damage along the seams.