As growers wrap up pruning and move on to thinning out under-sized and damaged fruit, Gayndah and District Fruit Growers Association secretary Judy Shepherd said yields were likely to be lower this season than last year's big crop.

Mrs Shepherd said light fruit loads were developing on the domestic variety Imperial mandarin crop while export variety Murcotts, which would be harvested later in the season, were bearing "about normal".

"The Imperials have less on than last year. There is no particular reason, it just happens. They are alternate bearing.

"Last year's crop was massive because of all the rain. They were overloaded last year, so they are backing off this year."

Mrs Shepherd said wet weather presented challenges for growers battling fungal diseases on their trees this year.

"It is tough to deal with if it is wet ? a wet season stops us getting onto the paddocks to spray for the fungal diseases," she said.

"But because we had such a bad year with fungal disease last year growers have been much more vigilant. There is a strong program to keep on top of any diseases coming through now and to keep the trees thinned."

Mrs Shepherd and her husband Ian, who is chairman of the local Gayndah Packers Cooperative, will watch the value of the Australian dollar closely because the focus of production on their Gayndah farm is on producing Murcott mandarins for export. "It was a bad year last year for exports," she said.

"Personally we did okay because we have some very established markets and our prices were almost on a par, but it had to be perfect fruit."

"If the Australian dollar goes up over the US dollar it starts to become problematic, especially $1.10 ? that's just awful. You barely cover shipping costs at that price.

"At $1.04 we take a hit but we can cope with it. Much over that we take a loss."

Picking of this season's lemon crop has started around Bundaberg and Gin Gin.