Healthy soils for sustainable farms
Healthy Soils – Leaving a Legacy for South Eastern Australia (HSSF) was a project focused on improving the health of soils in our region in an attempt to promote the sustainability of agricultural productivity into the future. This project was one of the six key areas within the ‘Making Conservation Pay’ program.
There has been a lot of research and knowledge generated on soil health in recent years – much of it lost on shelves. The HSSF project aims to:
- obtain the most relevant and useful information and extend this to farmers and advisers through a series of workshops and field days. These will be held between September 2006 and June 2009.
- improve farmers capacity to manage soil health issues
- enhance, develop and deliver information packages for farmers
- develop and promote industry based training packages
- establish demonstration sites across the region highlighting relevant management practices and strategies.
Farmers at the Nhill Understanding Your Soil Test workshop,
learning how to interpret their own soil results
Workshops
An extensive range of workshops were held across the Wimmera Mallee ensuring the information was extended to a wide audience of farmers and advisors.
For a comprehensive list of workshops and field days run, see the table below:
| Date | Event | Details | Location |
|---|---|---|---|
| 28 July 2009 21 July 2009 | Healthy Soils Workshop Soil biology & organic matter | Pauline Mele taught participants how to protect, maintain and increase the various forms of soil biology. | St. Arnaud Boort |
| 28 April 2009 | Healthy Soils Workshop for consultants and agronomists Soil water use efficiency | Neil Dalgliesh assisted consultants and agronomists to understand how soils store water and how this water can be accessed. | Birchip |
| 2 April 2009 | Healthy Soils Workshop for farmers Understanding your soil test | This workshops was designed to help farmers understanding their soil test results and putting them to use. | Quambatook |
| 1 April 2009 | Healthy Soils Workshop for farmers Understanding your soil test | Two workshops designed to help farmers understanding their soil test results and putting them to use. | Beulah Warracknabeal |
| 14 August 2008 | Healthy Soils Advisors Workshop for | Pauline Mele taught participants how to protect, maintain and increase the various forms of soil biology. | Birchip |
| 13 August 2008 | Healthy Soils Farmers Workshop for | Pauline Mele taught participants how to protect, maintain and increase the various forms of soil biology. | Birchip |
| 24 June 2008 | Healthy Soils Advisor Workshop | Catherine Botta taught participants how to assess their soil organic matter resource and understand how to protect, maintain and increase various forms of soil OM. | Murtoa |
| 20 June 2008 | Healthy Soils Advisor Workshop - | Mark Imhof taught participants to recognise soil structural problems and management constraints; how to protect, maintain, and improve soil structure. | Birchip |
| 8 May 2008 | Healthy Soils Farmer Workshop - | A workshop for farmers to help them understand their soil test results and putting them to use. Brooke White presented. Please refer to the flier below to discover how the 2 previous workshops went. | Birchip |
| 8 April 2008 | Healthy Soils Farmer Workshop | Two workshops presented to farmers to increase their understanding and confidence in soil testing for soil chemical attributes. | Nhill |
| 14 February 2008 | Healthy Soils Advisor Workshop | The workshop was for advisors and aimed to increase their understanding and confidence in soil testing for soil | |
| 3–5 July 2007 | Healthy Soils Symposium | A conference for farmers, agronomists, farm consultants, the fertiliser industry, soil scientists, researchers, extension officers, regional practitioners and catchment management authorities. | |
| Other events in 2007 | Three farmer training courses | Workshops addressed regional and local soil health issues. Topics included soil biology, subsoil limitations, soil water and nutrition, and stubble management and tillage. | |
| 21 September 2006 | Soil Water Workshop | Run by Neal Dalgleish (CSIRO Toowoomba), these workshops provided a hands-on lesson in how to understand, measure and manage soil water. | Manangatang Hopetoun Waitchie & Birchip |
| 20 September 2006 | Soil Water Workshop | ||
| 19 September 2006 | Soil Water Workshop |
Left: Bernard Noonan, DPI, in the Soil Pit at BCG's2008
Main Field Day located atCuryo.
Healthy Soils For Sustainable Farms Report
The Healthy Soils for Sustainable Farms program aimed to target practices that maintain and restore our soils. The publication can be downloaded from the Land & Water Australia's website www.lwa.gov.au/
Workshops
Workshops have been conducted by BCG, Southern Farming Systems, Mallee Sustainable Farming and Rural Solutions SA. The workshops aimed to build on the knowledge, networks and experience of the organisations involved. There was a focus on tailoring the content to the local needs of farmers, based on the market needs analysis and making use of locally relevant demonstration sites.
There are nine modules available for delivery:
- understanding soil health
- understanding soil types
- understanding soil structure
- understanding soil tests- chemical
- understanding soil biology
- managing soil organic matter
- managing subsoil constraints
- managing soil erosion
- understanding soil water use efficiency.
Understanding Soil Tests - Chemical
Several Understanding Soil Chemical Testing workshops for advisors and farmers have been delivered (Nhill, Sea Lake, Birchip, Beulah, Warracknabeal and Quambatook). These workshop aimed to give workshop participants a greater understanding and confidence in soil testing for soil chemical attributes. Several sessions were covered throughout the day to enable participants to:
- define the reason for soil testing and identify soil parameters that need to be measured
- identify and develop a sampling plan appropriate for their needs
- identify the characteristics of good laboratory service providers
- appreciate the range of approaches available to interpret results
- recognise and prepare a complete and well structured recommendation
- understand how to incorporate their learnings into a soil health management plan
- find further information and advice.
The workshops proved successful in helping farmers understand critical values for soil characteristics, what PBI is and how this relates to phosphorus, how to calculate fertiliser requirements for a potential yield, and how to convert mg/kg to kg/ha.
Brooke White presenting at the Warracknabeal
Understanding Your Soil Test workshop
Understanding Soil Types and Structures
Mark Imhof from DPI conducted the 'Understanding Soil Types and Structures" workshop on Friday 20 June in BCG's conference room. Nearly twenty farmers attended the workshop to get a better understanding of soil types and to learn how to recognise soil structural problems and management constraints on their farm. There were several powerpoint presentations, some practical exercises, and a trip to BCG's 2008 Main Research and Demonstration site to view a soil pit. Some of the highlights included:
- Recognise what is good and bad structure for soils
- Recognising the relationships between soil properties and soil management and structure
- Learning what farming practices can encourage good structure and remedy poor structure
- Recognising the importance of soil differences and the variability in soils
- Recognising the differences in key soil properties at the surface and at depth
- Recognising how the properties of soil affect what you want the soil to do.
 |  |
| Farmers wetting, molding, and ribboning different soil types | Mel Cann demonstrating how to assess what soil type is present |
Managing Soil Organic Matter
Catherine Botta presented the "Managing Soil Organic Matter" workshop in Murtoa in June 2008 and in Boort and St Arnaud in July 2009 for both advisors and farmers. The sessions were designed so that at completion participants were able to:
- Understand what soil organic matter and soil organic carbon are
- Understand the functions of organic matter in soil health
- Understand how soil organic matter composition changes and depletes
- Know how management practices will encourage organic matter cycling in their soils
- Understand how to incorporate their learnings into a soil health management plan
- Know where to find follow-up information and advice.
The majority of participants found the workshop to be useful, relevant, of high quality and an efficient use of their time.
Catherine Botta presenting at the Managing Soil
Organic Matter workshop in St Arnaud
Read more about the 2009 workshops.
Understanding Soil Biology
Pauline Mele, a principle research scientist at DPI, statewide leader for soil biology and winner of Land and Water Australia's Senior Research Fellowship and Damian Bougoure from DPI's Biosciences Research Division conducted workshop in Birchip in 2008 and Boort and St Arnaud in 2009. Two workshops were held in Birchip one for consultants/advisors and one for farmers. The 2009 workshops were designed for both farmers and advisors. The interaction between Pauline and the participants at each workshop was great with many topics being thoroughly discussed with alternate nutrition products creating much discussion at the 2009 workshops.
Pauline Mele presenting at the St Arnaud Soil Biology workshop
At the Birchip workshops participants were given a practical exercise to test how much organic matter was present in their sample of soil. Samples were then placed under the microscope to view what bacteria, fungi or other organisms could be seen in their soil samples.
A participant looking through the microscope for
organisms within the soil sample
Of special interest in the 2008 workshops was the new research that Pauline is currently working on called 'Microassays'. It is a really new technology that is going to vastly increase our understanding of what soil biology is present in the soil and what activity is occurring.
Other topics that were discussed throughout the workshops included:
- what soil biology is and its contribution to soil health
- why is soil biology so important for environmental sustainability
- what regulates soil biology and how soil biology can change
- what techniques are available to measure and monitor soil biology
- how management affects soil biology and how changes to management may improve soil biology.
Read more about the 2009 workshops.
Demonstration sites
BCG established four sites to demonstrate and evaluate soil health management practices at a local scale. Management practices at the demonstration sites were compared spatially through paired paddocks and temporally through long term trials.These siteswere located at Sea Lake, Birchip and Minyip.
Click on the image to view a larger map showing the
locations of the four demonstration sites.
Sea Lake
The hosts for this paired demonstration sitewere Mick McClelland and Justin Brennan. The site was located between five and ten kilometres north of Sea Lake on the Sea Lake – Swan Hill Road. These particular sites were selected because of their current involvement in two other projects in which BCG participates – the Farming Systems Project and the Capacity Building for Sustainable Landscapes (Landcare) project. The HSSF project at the Sea Lake site focused on Precision Agriculture and the impact it has on soil health.
Birchip
There were two demonstration sites located in the Birchip area – one at BCG's long term Farming Systems Trial site, and the other at BCG's Main Field Day site.
Farming Systems Site
The Farming Systems site was located 28 kilometres north of Birchip on the property of Ian and Warrick McClelland. This site was established in 1999 to help determine the medium to long-term impacts of four different farming systems on the financial viability and physical and environmental sustainability of the farming operation. The site focused ondemonstrating the impact of compaction on soil health over time.For more information look at the Soil Health Activities in the Wimmera Mallee- Birchip Site Fact Sheet.
Click here for the detailed analysis and management considerations for a No till and cultivated plot from the Farming Systems Site.
More information on the Flexible Farming Systems trial
BCG Main Field Day Site
BCG's Main Field Day site for 2008 was on the property of Peter and Brenda Doran, Curyo, 30km north-west of Birchip on the Sunraysia highway. The soils type is a sandy clay loam.
The Main Field Day site was selected for use in the HSSF project to provide farmers with an opportunity to improve their knowledge and understanding of soil health at the same place where they could learn the latest about BCG's trial work. A soil pit demonstration at the field day site proved to be very successful as farmers could visually see how soil morphology, chemistry and physics impact on soil management and from this, understand how management practices can directly impact soil properties.
More detailed soil information
Farmers inspect the soil pit demonstration site at the BCG Main Field Day.
Minyip
The Minyip site was located approximately fifteen kilometers east of Minyip on the properties of Peter Walsh & Shane McGrath. The sitewas part of a collaborative project with the Victorian No-Till Farmers Association, and the paired paddocks compared the impact on soil health of a strict no-till farming system with a system that included some degree of cultivation.
Useful websites
Victorian Resources Online - DPI's Victorian Resources Online (VRO) is your gateway to a wide range of natural resources information and associated maps that will be progressivley developed and continually expanded throughout the course of the project. You can access this information at both state-wide and regional levels across Victoria. The soils webpage covers some broad areas of interest in more detail such as:
- Soil and Land Survey Directory- contains details of over 100 major soil and land surveys conducted throughout Victoria
- Surface Soil pH- describes and maps the significance and management of soil pH in Victoria
- Soil Management- by understanding the behaviour of soils we can maximise their use in a sustainable way. Soil structure degradation, nutrient decline, acidification and erosion can occur for many soils which are poorly managed
- Soil Health- refers to the 'fitness' (condition) of soil to support specific uses (eg. crop growth).
Catchment Knowledge Exchange - The Catchment Knowledge Exchange (CKE) project is testing the concept of knowledge brokering, with the first trial area being soil health. The CKE is an initiative of the Victorian Catchment Management Council and is supported by the National Action Plan on Salinity and Water Quality (NAP).
Healthy Soils Australia - contains information regarding healthy soils for anyone who manages land.
Project funders and collaborators
The Healthy Soil for Sustainable Farms (HSSF) program was funded by the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry through the Natural Heritage Trust, in partnership with the GRDC and was managed by Land & Water Australia. Organisations who participated with BCG in the HSSF project include DPI Victoria, Rural Solutions SA, Southern Farming Systems, Mallee Sustainable Farming Incorporated and Nutrient Management Systems.
