Photo by Anthony Cornelius

The main reputable online sources of weather and climate forecasts for Australia are:

• Weather and warnings – Bureau of Meteorology
• Water and the Land (WATL) – Bureau of Meteorology.  WATL brings together climate and weather information. These include rainfall predictions up to 8 days ahead, cumulative seasons rainfall, temperature, wind, pressure, humidity, evaporation, sunshine and El Nino and La Nina patterns.
• Seasonal outlooks – Bureau of Meteorology.  This site include maps and tables showing anticipated temperatures as well as the chances of high or low rainfall over the next 3 months. There is also regular commentary and forecasts by National Climate Centre climatologists on the Southern Oscillation Index and forecasts of El Nino and La Nina events
• Multi-week forecasts – Centre for Ocean-Land-Atmosphere Studies.  Temperature and rainfall outlooks for the next 0-5 days, 6-10 days and over 10 day anomalies are available.
• Multi-week forecasts – Bureau of Meteorology. The Bureau of Meteorology, with help from Managing Climate variability, is developing an Australian multi-week forecast. The bureau will use the POAMA model for weather predictions, which should improve reliability, especially for predicting extreme weather events. These predictions will be 2-4 weeks ahead, making them potentially very useful to vegetable growers.