Encouragingly, the Tractor and Machinery Association of Australia (TMA) says tractor deliveries in January, as opposed to when customers sign their contracts, were up by an encouraging 22pc on the previous year's.

“This was the highest January outcome since the sales peak in 1990 and more than 40pc higher than the average number of January sales of the previous five years,” TMA executive director Vin Delahunty said.

The March returns, however, have seen some of the heat go out of the market, with sales for the month down 14pc on 2006 sales levels.

With the La Nina weather event officially on the wane, the worry is that the traditional autumn break may have gone missing once again.

After suffering a slump in sales during the heart of the drought, farmers are once more buying higher powered tractors with sales up 70pc.

Mr Delahunty said the story was even more impressive in February with sales for the month at the highest since 1984.

“More than 1,000 new tractors were delivered for the month with sales up more than 34pc compared with that of the year earlier,” he said.

“The February result was about 38pc higher than the average sales for that month over the previous five years,” Mr Delahunty added.

While there are concerns that farmers have started to put away their cheque books in the absence of widespread planting rains, and a reduction in the availability of some stock, the upside centres on a 10pc lift in the sale of bigger machines during early March.

“A positive for the industry is that demand for quality second-hand machinery has risen and much of that stock has now been cleared from farm machinery dealer’s yards,” Mr Delahunty said.

* Extract from 10-page Farm Machinery Feature in all Rural Press farm newspapers, May 22.