Warialda district fairs well with its reasonably regular rainfall, although this year’s start to summer was unlike anything Paul Cush, Myall Park, has witnessed in his 32 years at the property, 20km north of town.
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Where there should have been storms and rain there was none, however individual rain events managed to deposit sufficient moisture to initiate a summer crop.
Mr Cush eyed 40 hectares, fallow from the previous November, and sowed Pioneer SSS forage sorghum, 30mm deep, fertilising with 100 kilograms of urea a hectare and 50kg/ha “starter mix” of mostly mono ammonium phosphate.
That was the end of September and young plants took advantage of October rain to the point where a dry November didn’t matter as much. As of mid December it was one metre high and starting to head.
The block is now fenced into four paddocks while 110 Angus and Charolais cows with 96 calves, run as two mobs, rotate around each other with sectors allowed three weeks’ rest before grazing resumes.
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“Our primary aim is to feed our cattle but we’ll bale it if it gets ahead of us,” Mr Cush said, explaining that native grasses were especially slow to come back this season.only responding after early December.
“This is the first time we have tried something to give our grass a spell,” Mr Cush said. “Normally we get storms in early summer but we’ve never had this situation in the 32 years I’ve lived here.
“However this system is working so well I think we’ll continue with it into the future.”
Elsewhere in the district there is sorghum just emerging through to crops that are beginning to ripen, says McGregor Gourlay Senior Agronomist Scott Rogers, based at Moree.
"Most crops were planted into good soil profiles but we will need more rain soon."
Mr. Rogers covers country all around Moree including; Garah,Terry Hie Hie, Crooble and Croppa Creek.
Some early crops were planted in mid-September into long-fallow country with less than ideal soil temperatures at the time but it was a punt that has paid off with those early crops expected to yield really well.
“The rain was quite sporadic and in most areas nowhere near what was predicted,” reported Mr Rogers. Falls ranged anywhere from 5mm to 80mm.
The strange ex-cyclone Owen complex, which twinned with a southern low in a way we haven’t seen for a while, delivered nothing for some and too much rain on some isolated areas around the Bellata district.
Some areas of late sown sorghum, and cotton, literally getting washed away in a gully raker that dumped 70mm in 45 minutes.
Patchy falls of useful rain have been a benefit to growers, but only those who enough soil moisture to sow in the first place.
Agronomist Brad Cogan, Moree, says sorghum planted in early September and in some cases late August, have been able to capitalise on follow up rain in spite of cool soil temperatures early in the season.
Those first crops have finished flowering and are filling with grain. Later planted crops under some of those mid-December storms, both sorghum and dryland cotton, are up and away although they will need in crop rainfall to bring them over the line.
“You need to make the most of the next drop of moisture,” Mr Cogan advises. However a good soil profile is critical, with between 80 and 100 per cent moisture required for sorghum, to one metre depth or 150 to 200mm stored water.
The successful crops this season had good moisture and were planted on long fallow paddocks.
Heavy falls around Bundarra benefited a few but failed to provide for others. Georgie Oakes, Local Land Services agronomist based at Inverell, said the deficit of soil moisture would continue to haunt producers until widespread rain filled that gap.
“The rain we had in mid December was certainly not a drought breaker,” she said although some localities near Bundarra collected as much as 90mm in one slow moving storm the week before Christmas.
Plan your planting around soil moisture
Patchy falls of useful rain have been a benefit to growers, but only those who enough soil moisture to sow in the first place.
Agronomist Brad Cogan, Moree, says sorghum planted in early September and in some cases late August, have been able to capitalise on follow up rain in spite of cool soil temperatures early in the season.
Those first crops have finished flowering and are filling with grain. Later planted crops under some of those mid-December storms, both sorghum and dryland cotton, are up and away although they will need in crop rainfall to bring them over the line.
“You need to make the most of the next drop of moisture,” Mr Cogan advises. However a good soil profile is critical, with between 80 and 100 per cent moisture required for sorghum, to one metre depth or 150 to 200mm stored water.
The successful crops this season had good moisture and were planted on long fallow paddocks.
Heavy falls around Bundarra benefited a few but failed to provide for others. Georgie Oakes, Local Land Services agronomist based at Inverell, said the deficit of soil moisture would continue to hinder producers until widespread rain filled that soil profile considerably.
“The rain we had in mid-December was certainly not a drought breaker,” she said although some localities near Bundarra collected as much as 150mm in one slow moving storm the week before Christmas. Other paddocks nearby got just a spit.
Bundarra producer Leanne Collins was among the lucky few getting 70mm before Christmas but she said planning for sowing of any crop around a calendar date was all but useless in the current climate.
“We used to plant our winter oats, for instance, in February but now we plant on moisture,” she said.