Two cattle stations in northern Western Australia could be facing animal cruelty charges after 500 cattle were reportedly found dead on a station in the Pilbara, one month after 1,000 cattle died at Noonkanbah station in the Kimberley.

WA’s agriculture minister, Alannah MacTiernan, has confirmed that the Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development is investigating the deaths at an unnamed Pilbara station, with a view to possible charges under the Animal Welfare Act.

MacTiernan said the department had conducted aerial and on-the-ground inspections to determine the number of animals affected, and that as of Tuesday more than 100 cattle had been euthanised.

The ABC has reported that at least 500 cattle have died and a further 1,000 are at risk.

Northern WA has experienced an unseasonably dry and hot summer. Data from the Bureau of Meteorology shows that the rainfall for the wet season, which runs from November to April, has been well below the long-term average.

MacTiernan said that was no excuse for failing to provide cattle with adequate access to food and water.

“This has been a particularly hot and dry season in the north-west, and we remind all pastoralists to remain vigilant,” she said. “Clearly cattle cannot be left to just fend for themselves in these conditions – all pastoralists must accept their animal welfare responsibilities.”

The investigation comes after an estimated 2,500 camels were shot in the Goldfields region of WA and more than 100 feral horses, donkeys and goats died or were euthanised in central Australia because they were dying of thirst.

Emma White, the chief executive of the Kimberley Pilbara Cattlemen’s Association, said the west Kimberley and inland regions of the Pilbara had experienced a dry start to the wet season, which meant that some dams that would ordinarily be full by January remained dry.

But she said pastoralists were expected to be able to manage drier periods and it was “disappointing” that two stations had not done so.

Stations in northern WA use a mixture of bore water and dams to provide stock water.

“The main issue is ensuring that you have staff to do daily bore runs and to check the bores are operating and the troughs are filling,” White told Guardian Australia. “It’s a hard job, it is demanding doing this work, but it is an expectation that pastoralists are able to face these challenges.”

Noonkanbah is an Aboriginal-owned station and was at the centre of one of the first land rights struggles in WA in 1980, leading to the formation of the Kimberley Land Council.

A BoM spokesman, Neil Bennett, said while far north Queensland was experiencing one of its wettest years to date, rainfall in northern WA and much of the Northern Territory had been “sporadic”.

“We have not had a tropical cyclone or a tropical low through the northern part of WA so far,” he said. “It’s not quite El Niño conditions but very similar to what an El Niño does in WA during our summer.”

The average summer rainfall in northern Australia has increased in the past 30 years, but rainfall totals for areas of the west Kimberley and western Pilbara from October to December were among the driest on average.

Temperatures have also been above average. Marble Bar, which advertises itself as the hottest town in Australia, was above 40C for the first 25 days of 2019. It dipped to 38.4C on Saturday but was above 40C again on Sunday.