DARLING Downs graingrower Russell Grundy says if he can dodge the storms, he's on track for a bumper harvest on his Jondaryan farm Greniff.
Inspired by a "brilliant" $360/tonne price for prime hard wheat, Mr Grundy said the outlook was the best in years for his grain and cattle operation.
"It's a brilliant time to be farmer with the way cattle and grain prices are going," Mr Grundy said.
"The only real worry at the moment are these storms that are floating around. It's great weather to be harvesting, but don't need any hold ups.
"Once we're got the crop in the silos, then we can all draw breath. Until then, we'll all be going as hard as we can to get the harvest done."
Not that there will be any stopping once the winter crop has been harvested. Mr Grundy is already in the process of planting a 200ha sorghum crop.
This year, Mr Grundy has 250 hectares of winter crop, including 125ha of Reliant wheat and 125ha of Roslyn, Leabrook and Planet barley, on his scrub soil farm just east of Jondaryan.
The crops are being harvested using a Gleaner R-72 header, which has been in operation since the late 1990s.
"It's a great old machine," Mr Grundy said. "It might not have all the technology of the newest machines, but it has always done a terrific job."
Assisted by Southbrook-based farm mechanic Edward van der Velde on the 8t chaser bin, Mr Grundy was racing the advancing storm weather when Queensland Country Life called in last week to check on the harvest of this year's bumper crop.
The crop was planted on excellent moisture and received good in-crop rain. However, the wheat was showing the signs of recent strong winds with the crop leaning noticeably to the west.
"The lean on the crop just makes it a bit slower when we're heading in that direction," Mr Grundy said.
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