Persistent rain during the past week, combined with chilly weather on the weekend, should give way to milder conditions for parts of Victoria in the last days of winter.
Daytime temperatures were more than 4°C cooler than average for much of the east coast last Saturday - and Lake Eildon had its coldest August day on record (dating back 51 years), only reaching 6°C.
Myrrhee, in the north east, had 88.6 millimetres of rain during the August 21-23 period.
Winter 2020 is on track to be drier than average for most of Victoria, except for East Gippsland.
August rainfall has been close to average for much of the state, but during June there was below average rainfall in most parts - and July was very dry in the west.
Compared to winter, spring is looking much wetter for Victoria.
The latest outlook for spring - from the one-month and three-month outlooks that are updated every Thursday - shows high chances of above average rainfall across the northern areas of the state.
The chances reduce gradually towards the south, and only slightly favour a wetter than usual spring for the south west coast - with a 60-65 per cent chance.
The one-month outlook for September shows northern Victoria is likely to be wetter than average, but there are roughly equal chances of a wetter or drier than average month for most of the south.
October looks set to do most of the heavy-lifting at this stage and is likely to bring above average rainfall to the whole state, with very high chances - of greater than 80 per cent - across the north.
The wet outlook for spring is being driven by an increased chance of either La Nina, or a negative Indian Ocean Dipole - or both - occurring in the coming months.
Both La Nina and negative Indian Ocean Dipole events typically increase the likelihood of above average rainfall across much of Australia, including Victoria, during winter and spring.
To date, 2020 has delivered the most inflow into water storages across the Murray-Darling Basin (MDB) since 2016.
Water storage in the MDB is 52.4 per cent full, which is up 11.3 per cent from this time last year.
Water storage in the South East Coast division - which covers southern and eastern Victoria - is 38.1 per cent full, which is up 4.6 per cent from this time last year.
Root zone soil moisture for August to date is below average in Victoria's south west and north east; above average across parts of Gippsland - especially East Gippsland; and close to average in most other parts.
