Rain or no rain, he says sowing strictly to the calendar improves his yields by up to 20 per cent.

In the past, this has meant dry sowing, which he is happy to do even if it means there are a few extra weeds to tackle later on.

In conjunction with a strict seeding program, using a disc seeder improves yields by more than 5pc and improves the speed of his seeding program by 35pc.

Ben is a sixth-generation farmer and crops 2200 hectares with his wife Bess and his parents Ray and Lyn.

They grow beans, lentils, canola, wheat - including durum - and barley, and believe sowing by the calendar has helped to combat the run of dry springs in the past three years.

"If we delay seeding, we can see a yield loss and we really believe getting it in on time is the key," Ben said.

"I think there is a lot more to lose by sowing later rather than dry-sowing early - the yield penalties can be large if you sow late and have a dry spring, and we have had a few of those in the past," he said.

"If we waited until an opening rain, our bean and canola crops would be two weeks delayed rather than coming up with the opening rain.

"In the end, we get better gross margins and if we don't get an opening rain until June we would still dry-sow it at the set time."

All beans and legumes are sown ideally by April 30 and cereals finished by May 15, and sticking to these set dates has worked except on one occasion.

Canola was sown twice one year, after dying with only 7 millimetres of rain and pounded by consecutive days of 37 degrees or more.

"It's only happened once and we are prepared to take the risk," he said.

But this year's opening rain has given Ben the confidence to sow the rest of his crop.

"It was a brilliant start, just like the past three years and we couldn't have asked for better."

His property received between 40mm and 70mm in this year's break and another 7-15mm with the top-up rains.

"We are lucky that we have a pretty reliable rainfall ranging from 425-475mm annually."

* Extract from a full report in Stock Journal, May 28 issue.