HEAVY rain dumped more than 200mm on parts of Victoria in the past week.

Rainfall records were rewritten in southwest Victoria, good falls were recorded in Gippsland and hail fell in northern parts of the state.

Pennyroyal Creek, southeast of Colac, received 223mm in three hours last Thursday night - more than four times its average February rainfall and a new record.

According to the Bureau of Meteorology the heavy falls were from a line of thunderstorms and very localised.

Ricketts Marsh, near Birregurra, recorded 88mm for the week to Monday morning and Mt Sabine, in the Otways, 168mm.

Nearby Colac recorded just 9mm, Hamilton 22mm, Casterton 9mm and Coleraine 3mm.

However, most of the Mallee and Wimmera missed out.

In the Harcourt Valley, south of Bendigo, apple growers were hit by a freak hailstorm on Friday night with reported falls of up to 44mm.

Harcourt Fruit Growers Association president Trevor Peeler knew of four growers badly affected and said it came at the worst possible time as Gala apples were ready to be picked.

"It's probably the best looking crops in Harcourt for 15 years prior to hail coming through. It's caused a bit of havoc for growers up here," Mr Peeler said.

In Gippsland a series of thunderstorms brought some good rain from the south to the high country with the highest falls recorded in Tubbut, near the NSW border, with 87mm, followed by Glenmaggie Creek (52mm), Dellicknora (49mm), Licola (49mm) and Omeo (34mm).

A large storm last Thursday dumped 43mm at Buchan and caused local flooding which damaged the Buchan Caves Reserve tourist attraction.

Cowwarr cattle producer John O'Brien said he had received 40-50mm over the weekend and despite local flood warnings there was not enough rain to generate problems.

BOM climate meteorologist Harvey Stern said the thunderstorms were as a result of La Nina events, but were in contrast to last year's deluge.

"There's been scattered thunderstorms rather than widespread rain and a lot of places missed out, it's not like last year when we had widespread rain everywhere," Dr Stern said.