La Nina is easing, but El Nino could bring droughts and bushfires

La Nina conditions have prevailed for three years, leaving eastern states flooded and roads ravaged, but El Nino could bring heat, drought and bushfires.

The Bureau of Meteorology's climate models forecast the ocean along Australia's east coast will cool, and temperatures will return into neutral by the end of February.

Weatherzone meteorologist Felix Levesque said the return to neutral will mean less rain in coming months.

"By February to March it looks to return to a pretty neutral stage," he said.

Some models say El Nino indications could occur as early as June, but Mr Levesque said "it'll probably be further out before it can be declared".

"El Nino conditions mean cooler water temperatures off eastern Australia that drives below average rainfall across eastern Australia," he said.

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El Nino years tend to see warmer-than-average temperatures across most of southern Australia, particularly during the second half of the year, the BoM says.

The shift in rainfall away from the western Pacific, associated with El Nino, means that Australian rainfall is usually reduced through winter-spring, particularly across the eastern and northern parts of the continent.

Nine of the 10 driest winter-spring periods on record for eastern Australia occurred during El Nino years. In the Murray-Darling Basin, winter-spring rainfall averaged over all El Nino events since 1900 was 28 per cent lower than the long-term average, with the severe droughts of 1982, 1994, 2002, 2006 and 2015 all associated with El Nino.