Mixed harvest for Bradford family at Ballidu

More often though, both can be true at the same time and that has certainly been the case for the Bradford family at Ballidu.

In terms of weather at harvest they've been lucky - while the likes of Dalwallinu, Cadoux and Kalannie around them were pelted by rain and hail last month, they barely received more than a few millimetres.

Unfortunately that doesn't mean it was all sunshine this season, with a mice infestation causing major damage and yield losses to their canola program.

Mick Bradford, who farms the 3200 hectare program alongside his wife Leanne and son Jarrod, said they started having problems with mice over the past couple of years and this season he was probably a week late with the bait.

"At seeding time, my son sprays and I seed and as we're only a two-person operation - I work from morning to 11pm and it doesn't give me much time to spread bait," Mr Bradford said.

"I was trying to do everything myself to save money but it has probably cost us more in the long run as by the time I got around to it, the damage had already been done.

"The main paddock which was affected was about 120 hectares and we lost about 30 per cent of that to mice damage."

It was frustrating to witness the bare patches in the paddock as he put the header through it towards the end of last month, but ultimately he learned an important lesson - get contractors in to help out when needed.

While the yield loss was disappointing to see in a year when canola prices were at an almost all-time high, it wasn't all despair as overall more canola was still harvested given the increase in hectares planted this season.

Usually the Bradfords plant about 350ha of canola but that more than doubled this season, with 830ha put in.

Some of that was Emu, which is what they normally plant, but a lot was seeded to Hyola 410XX as that was what they were able to get their hands on.

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The downside to that was the latter has a tendency to shed and that's exactly what happened in the wind associated with the various weather events last month.

"Before that it was going really well, but we probably lost about 10pc in those winds," Mr Bradford said.

"But that's the only impact we've had from the weather, so we've been very lucky."

Mice and wind damage aside, the canola yields have still been impressive with an average of about 1.7 tonnes per hectare.

The Bradfords were obviously happy with that result and won't be complaining about it, but it did mean getting through the canola was a slow and tedious process.

They started harvesting it on November 1 and finished up the 830ha more than three weeks later, on November 25.

"In the middle of the day, the canola fluffs up and gets dry so it doesn't feed as well, whereas in the mornings when it's just a little damp it feeds in beautifully and we're able to tick along faster," Mr Bradford said.

"With the yields up higher, it is slow going - we're sitting on 3.5 kilometres an hour and as soon as we try to push to 4-5km/ha, the header starts blocking up."

With the canola finished, the Bradfords were looking forward to getting into the 550ha of Beast barley where they're able to travel a bit quicker and get through it faster.

After that will be the 300ha of lupins and the program will finish with 1200ha of wheat.

They expect harvest to carry on into the early days of 2023 but have considered bringing in a contractor towards the end to help finish things up quicker.