A soils and pasture project ramps up later in March when landholders are invited to get back to basics as part of a soil workshop in Dooralong.
Co-ordinated by Greater Sydney Local Land Services (GSLLS) in partnership with Sydney Environmental & Soil Laboratory (SESL), the workshop will cover all aspects of best practice soil management, including testing demonstrations and results analysis.
Project Officer, Linda Hanlon, said the workshop was part of the GSLLS Healthy Soils, Productive Pastures project, currently in its second year.
“This project focusses on demonstrating best practice pasture and soil management specifically tailored to the Sydney Basin landscape,” she said.
“We’ve achieved a lot in the past year, having engaged an agronomist, prepped paddocks, conducted initial soil tests and sowed seeds.
“We now have two very flush looking trial paddocks of different trial pasture crops, complete with a newly introduced herd of 10 sheep at our demonstration farm.
“The sheep have been moved on and off the crops on a rotational basis to take the grazing pressures off the crop and encourage regeneration.
“This is a back to basics event with live demos on the why, how, who, what and when of conducting a thorough soil test, with the opportunity to have an expert interpret the results down the track,” Hanlon said.
As part of the project, GSLLS has also engaged several local farmers to conduct on-farm trials through funding grants and technical advice and assistance.
Agronomist with Ace Ohlsson Pty Ltd, Adam Little is the advisor on the trials and said the progress to date was encouraging.
“This is a great example of government and industry working together to support a more productive and sustainable agricultural industry with a focus on graziers and growers in the Sydney Basin,” he said.
The Dooralong workshop will be held on March 11 with registrations essential online.
The project is supported by Greater Sydney Local Land Services through funding from the Australian Government’s National Landcare Program.
Source:
Media release, Mar 1
Greater Sydney Local Land Services