• Introduction
• Weather and Soil Moisture Monitoring observations
• Speedo assessments - change in overall soil moisture at a particular site.
• Speedo soil moisture graphs
  • Mallee
  • Wimmera
  • North Central
  • North East
  • Gippsland cropping
  • South West

The soil moisture monitoring project, with the use of underground probes, provides real-time soil water content data to Victoria’s farmers.

Monitoring sites have been set up in cropping regions throughout the state by Agriculture Victoria.

The sites record soil water content at one source point from 30 centimetres down to one metre as a reference point for a paddock.

To access information provided in the graphs, log onto the Agriculture Victoria soil moisture monitoring dashboard.

No login or passwords required, and speedos are automatically updated and will represent the most recent rainfall.

Figure 1: Rainfall deciles for Victoria (December to end of March)

Below average rainfall for the Wimmera and Mallee for summer that continued the dry trend into the first month of autumn.

Figure 2.  April (month to date) rainfall percentages for Victoria (April 1 to April 17)

Widespread rain during 15 - 16 April with a system connected to the tail end of cyclone IIsa and tropical moisture confirmed an autumn break for many districts.

Figure 4. April rainfall (month to date) for Victoria (April 1 to April 17)

Mallee and parts of the Wimmera and Northern country received 25 - 50 millimetres of rainfall (month to date) but many areas in this zone have had an autumn break after earlier rain in April.

Month to date April rainfall zones of >50 millimetres have an excellent start to the season Recent and historical rainfall maps

Soil moisture measurements collected by the Agriculture Victoria moisture probe network have shown that generally, soil moisture profiles are all higher than commonly observed at this time of the year.

Mallee paddocks are starting the season with well above average moisture conditions despite the well below average summer rainfall. Wimmera, Central and Northeast are moderate/high to high and have some areas that have new season moisture connected to deeper moisture laid down in October and November 2022.

Moisture profiles in the Southwest have rapidly increased in the past month.

Most soil probe sites have had maintenance checks over summer and some field validation of the data over autumn to confirm the seasonal conditions. To see an example of soil cores knocked in manually and demonstrating the wet conditions, please see this link

Note - use extensionaus.com.au/soilmoisturemonitoring to monitor the changes to the sites relevant to you in between the next reporting period and following rain events.

Twenty-five per cent higher moisture levels than this time last year. Deep soil moisture is 100 per cent.

Ouyen seperate trace soil moisture graph – 20223 view

Deep soil moisture profiles remained stable over the dry summer, and the image above shows the connection to this soil moisture. It is estimated that infiltration is down to 60 centimetres with recent rain events in autumn as the soil was at or very close to field capacity. 

The Speed soil moisture monitoring site has a wet profile down to 100 centimetres.

The Agriculture Victoria dashboard also displays soil temperatures which shows the correlation of rain events cooling the soil with general temperature fall with deepening autumn conditions. When crops emerge quickly in autumn, it can be a combination of the available moisture and soil temperature influencing this response.

Speedo shows moisture profiles are 55 per cent higher than this time last autumn after monitoring stable moisture conditions over summer. There is now a connection to last season’s moisture.

Moisture conditions are better than this time last year and like other sites, there has been limited changes over summer. This site is an example of a high yielding crop last season that was late to mature and continued to use moisture through early December. The moisture per cent by sensor depth, indicates close to 75 per cent of plant available water through the soil.

https://extensionaus.com.au/soilmoisturemonitoring/Bangerang/

Deep soil moisture conditions are excellent and 35 per cent wetter than this time last year.

Back online after communication from the paddock was lost during last year. Low water use crops in 2022 have full profiles.  Paddock renovations were required after machinery traffic in the wet conditions created deep track marks.

The deep wet conditions demonstrated via social media during autumn, with the soil coring tubes easily being knocked into the ground, is provided HERE.

High water holding capacity soil (self-mulching clay) is still very wet to depth. It is 68 per cent higher than this time last year.

Please follow the link to the soil moisture monitoring dashboard to obtain the most recent changes in the Wimmera at Taylors Lake.

Deep soil moisture conditions are excellent at 74 per cent and are at similar levels as this time last year, however, the paddock has grown a canola crop during that time and was in fallow in 2021.

Note - this paddock was in fallow with no crop grown last year which will traditionally bank moisture. Moisture is expected to be positioned well below one metre. The soil type should permit the winter crop access to this in spring if there are periods where rainfall doesn’t meet crop requirements.

While the rain gauge appears blocked, recent changes to soil moisture would indicate the water has moved to 50 and possibly 60 centimetres.  This would be a connection to last year’s moisture and set the crop up to access the full profile and provide confidence for inputs to be applied to the crop.

Many cropping sites around Raywood are showing full deep profiles.

Modelled soil moisture at Elmore with the Soilwater  app compared to moisture probe data, indicates similar line trend changes associated with limited summer rainfall and effective weed control.  High yielding wheat last season left the deep profile 60 per cent full and improvements this autumn have already been observed.

Youanmite has a full profile and connection of new seasons moisture to the deep moisture carryover from 2022.

The Giffard West site in Gippsland had a 77 per cent moisture increase over the past month.

The Lake Bolac site had intermittent data connection in the past week, but prior to this, moisture profiles were full with the summed graph and individual sensor graph showing the positive response to rain over the Easter holiday period.

Offline during a period over summer, the spring sown chick peas consumed most of the freely available water in the profile at Hamilton. Data collected and displayed again, the recent rainfall has moved moisture down with some small increases of moisture at the deeper depths. Sensors are wet at 30 and 40 cm.

https://extensionaus.com.au/soilmoisturemonitoring/Hamilton/

The second probe site at Yalla - Y - Poora in the Southwest is in the process of conversion to the dashboard format. Finishing last season at about 60 per cent plant available water remaining, over March and early April, moisture has improved 40 per cent.