The weather bureau is on El Niño watch this winter-spring, while snow has arrived in some parts of the country

The ski season will open early this year with a late autumn cold snap delivering blankets of snow to ski fields in Victoria and New South Wales. Mount Buller, Perisher and the Selwyn Snow Resort have all announced they’ll be opening this weekend.

Mount Buller in Victoria, which is blanketed in 40cm of snow, has announced it cannot wait until the Queen’s birthday long weekend to get the ski season underway so it’s bringing the kick off forward a week.

The resort is offering a free day skiing and boarding on 1 June and will open a new $6m express chairlift.

Perisher in the Snowy Mountains of NSW, has had multiple days of blizzard-like conditions this week, with 75cm of early snowfall.

Selwyn Snow Resort opened for business on Thursday, becoming the first in Australia to do so this season. The Snowy Mountains-based resort is offering free skiing and snowboarding until Sunday to celebrate the milestone.

But not all skifields are following suit, with Thredbo planning to open over the June long weekend.

Perisher Ski Resort (@PerisherResort) WE’RE OPENING EARLY! With over 60cm of snow in the last 3 days Perisher will open this Friday 31 May! ❄️🙌🏼 See more 👉🏼 https://t.co/LZjnhoF527 pic.twitter.com/rJiYnMyPrv

While south-east Australia suffers through a chilly end to May, the weather bureau is predicting a warmer and drier than average winter for most of the country.

The Bureau of Meteorology’s winter climate outlook, released on Thursday, shows eastern and central parts of the nation are likely to receive below average rainfall. The news will be a blow to farmers struggling with drought.

The bureau’s manager of long-range forecasting, Andrew Watkins, said June rainfall was likely to be below average in New South Wales, Victoria, eastern South Australia, and southern parts of both Queensland and the Northern Territory.

“Drier than average conditions typically mean more cloud-free nights, which increases the risk of frost in susceptible areas,” he said.

Winter nights are very likely to be warmer than average in Tasmania, along the mainland’s south-east coast, and northern Western Australia stretching through parts of the NT, Watkins said.

The bureau is on El Niño watch and believes there’s a 50% chance of one developing in 2019.

El Niño events typically mean reduced rainfall for eastern Australia during winter-spring.

Watkins said warmer sea surface temperatures in the western Indian Ocean relative to the east, known as a positive Indian Ocean Dipole, is likely to develop in June.

This typically brings below average winter-spring rainfall and snowfall to southern and central Australia and warmer temperatures to much of the country.

“This certainly doesn’t mean we will have no rainfall over winter – it is the southern wet season after all – but it does support the model outlook for a drier than average winter, with the possibility of more evaporation than normal,” Watkins said.

Watkins said preliminary figures show autumn 2019 is likely to go down as one of Australia’s five warmest autumns on record.

Daytime temperatures have been much warmer than average for much of Australia, with the only exception being near average temperatures in Queensland away from the south, he said.

On Wednesday, Melbourne had its coldest May day since 2000, while a once in 20 year snowfall hit Ballarat in central Victoria. Ballarat’s temperature climbed to a top of 5.4C at 10.30am.