Wonthaggi and Mornington break century-long records for April rain

Bass grazier Trevor Heywood said he's had the "perfect start" with the rain, after recording 75 millimetres on his 76-hectare property.

He has 100 Angus and Hereford breeding cows, and cuts his own silage.

"This is the perfect start, we'll have a follow up from this now," he said.

"If we get a follow up in the next 10 days it'll be an autumn break."

He said they had no rain since the final week of January and were dry, but had a "fantastic spring" until mid-January.

He said now there's been rain, he will increase his feed rate with silage and hay, and sow 16 hectares of oats in the next week or two.

"I follow Inigo Jones, the long-range weather forecast," Mr Heywood said.

"He gives rain dates for months, and he was saying we were going to be dry up until now and there'd be rain now, then another dry patch.

"The ground is still warm so the grass is going to start growing reasonably quick."

Bureau of Meteorology senior meteorologist Lincoln Trainor said there was heavy rain in the north central, central, west and south Gippsland districts.

"In terms of heavy, we mean 50 to 80 millimetres of rain, across the northern parts we did see rainfall of around 10 to 25mm with some isolated totals up to 50mm," he said.

"In the past 24 hours the state has seen a trough across the state during yesterday afternoon and a front crossed overnight with an associated low pressure system.

"Combined with an upper trough enhanced a lot of rainfall overnight."

He said it was "definitely" what the Bureau would consider an autumn break for most of the state, which is classified by an accumulation of 25mm of rain across a three-day period.

He said several sites broke 20-year records, while Mornington broke its 157-year record for highest daily rain in April at 65.2mm, and Wonthaggi's 114-year record with 64.4mm.

Meanwhile, 20-year records include Coldstream with 66mm, 82.2mm at Marysville, 68.4mm at Taggerty, 75.6mm at Kinglake West, 92.4mm at Upper Plenty, 53.2mm at Seymour and 55.6mm at Pyalong.

"It's definitely considered a wet start to April," Mr Trainor said.

"The records show it was an unusual event, generally the autumn break happens in mid-April, for the central district it's come two weeks early."

He said he expected the rain to ease, with a relatively dry Thursday and Friday.

GRDC National Variety Trials southern manager Trevor Garnett said the widespread rainfall across most cropping regions would add to stored soil moisture for the coming season.

"This will germinate weeds, providing an opportunity for a knockdown spray prior to seeding," he said.