While some of the state’s countrymen survived scorching temperatures unseen in more than 100 years, one Riverina farmer said it was just another year on the land. 

Heatwaves swept the state in February, pushing the mercury to 45 degrees in Wagga on Friday, 10, which was just shy of the all-time 45.2 degree high on Saturday, February 7, 2009.

The hottest day in January this year was recorded at 41.6 degrees – a few degrees short of the 44.8 degree record in 2001. 

True to predictions, the Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) forecast of a warmer and drier season brought with it very little rain and heavily increased the fire-danger risk. 

The average-seasonal temperatures across Wagga increased 2.3 degrees on daytime records, with a one-degree increase on average-minimum temperatures.  

North Wagga farmer Graham White said it wasn’t as bad as it could have been. 

“You work around it,” he said. “It’s dry but that’s okay this time of year.” 

The stock and cereal farmer of 45 years said it was all part of the game. 

“Every year is different,” he said. “If it’s hot and dry till winter it will give us a late start – especially from a feed point of view for stock –but we’ve seen it all before.

“We’re great adapters – we have to do it every year.”

NSW sweated through its hottest summer in record history while the country experienced its the 12th-warmest season and BOM researchers said it was part of a noticeable and worrying trend. 

NSW climatologist Agata Imielska said Australia had warmed an entire degree since 1910, shifting the entire distribution of temperatures. 

“You’re not getting the same sort of cool temperatures between the hot days,” Ms Imielska said. “We’re seeing temperatures we haven’t seen before.”

Ms Imielska said heatwaves were bigger killers than any weather-related hazard.

“Seeing an increase in temperatures and intensity does have a concerning impact,” she said. “At this point in time we’re looking at a warm, dry 2017.