Textbook seeding start at Calingiri

At the beginning of May, the Woods' two farms received between 30 and 40 millimetres of rain, while ex-Tropical Cyclone Seroja, delivered another 15mm in April.

At the property that is closer to Wyening, at least 120mm of summer rain also came down - including 90mm as a result of the weather event that caused Northam to flood in March.

While the farm just north of Calingiri didn't receive quite as much over the summer, the soil profile is still at an ideal moisture level across both properties.

"It gives a degree of comfort and certainty around our yields," Ms Woods said.

"We've found out that you don't actually need too many rainfall events to grow a crop - if you get the right amount at the right time, you can get a decent yield with surprisingly low season rainfall.

"We're going to get the crop up, out of the ground and off to a fantastic start, so yield wise we're already ahead of where we were last year and any other year where we didn't have summer rain or anything decent until the end of May."

The beginning of 2021 is the polar opposite to last year, with 2020 conspiring of a tough start and a struggle to get too many double digit rainfall events - something that is very uncommon for where the Woods' farm in Calingiri.

"At particular points where it mattered most, it came just in time and the end result was that our yield was better than anticipated even though the rainfall was on par with the year before," Ms Woods said.

"It was one of our driest years, but I think the timing of the rainfall events kept the crop going and we were probably only 20 per cent down and we didn't have any quality issues."

After last year, the Woods' really weren't too excited about starting this season, but after plenty of summer rain, a great opening break, record prices and some new tools up their sleeves, things are looking better than they have in a long time.

One of those new tools was the addition of using a soil wetting agent - SE14 - when seeding canola and lupins.

SE14 is a product that is placed directly next to the seed during planting and attracts moisture exactly where it is needed.

"Last year we had two wind events and at one point I went to check the lupins and the seed was under a good few inches of soil," Ms Woods said.

"For them to see daylight was a pretty big task, so this year we wanted to make sure they got a good germination.

"That has happened already which is incredible because last year nothing had germinated by this time."

Seeding of the roughly 3300 hectare program kicked off on April 17 - about a third of it is oats and the rest is made up of canola, wheat, barley and lupins.

While the quantity of export oats that went in this year has declined, there is still a large program of domestic product that has gone in as the rotational benefits of hay are very valuable in their program.

Suzanne's son Reuben helps to run the cropping program alongside his father, Steve, and brother-in-law, Brent Leeson.

Reuben said they were halfway through the program with only barley, wheat and oats to go.

"We usually leave the oats to last and don't do them until after the middle of May," Reuben said.

"At the end of the season, you want to make sure you're clear of those August rains - we don't want to end up having to cut too early as you end up very exposed because it needs to sit in the paddock for 10 days."

It was canola that got seeding going in the middle of April, with half of that going to Clearfield 44Y94 and the other half made up of Roundup Ready 44Y27 and Raptor TF.

"We tried to start a little earlier, but it always takes a week once you get everything organised," Reuben said.

"If we could have gone closer to when the cyclone came through it would have been a bit better and we might have got a better germination of canola, but we still got the majority of it up.

"The canola took about a week and a half to sow and then we moved on to Jurien lupins, which went in just before the rain, and from there we went onto Planet barley which we started on May 7 after things dried up."

While Spartacus had been the barley of choice for the past couple of years, the decision to switch to Planet this season was in the hope it would yield better with the earlier start.

The entire program will be finished by the end of the month and after sowing into moisture for the first time in five years, the Woods' are feeling very optimistic about the next few months.

"The price of canola at the moment is just extraordinary, wheat has come in and barley hasn't collapsed the way anyone expected," Ms Woods said.

"Hopefully with a good early start we'll be able to get some good yields and with the high prices we should be looking at an above average year.

"There's a long way to go but with a good start, at least it gets everything out of the ground and you've got a degree of comfort."