NEWS
Media Release
RegenWA’s ‘Accelerating the Adoption of Regenerative Agriculture’ project has funded 12 demonstration sites across Western Australia. These demonstrations are intended to de-risk management change and equip growers with the confidence to trial and evaluate regenerative practices. Sites are being established from Yalgoo in the north, to Albany in the south, and east into the wheatbelt, across a wide range of enterprises.
To better understand best practice and benefits of cover cropping, including species selection, optimal planting times and techniques, and soil health impacts, two complementary demonstrations have been established on horticulture and viticulture properties near Albany.
Murray Gomm (Oranje Tractor Wine) kicked off his demonstration with seed coating. “We gave the seeds a good start in life by coating them with a slurry of vermicast…freeze dried microbes, milk and molasses… (and) a light spray of minerals – magnesium, manganese, zinc, copper and cobalt, in the cement mixer.” Murray’s midrow cover crops were sown in March, using a hand broadcasting technique alongside a hand-operated cultivator with blades designed to vertically slice the soil. This minimum-till method will establish thin strips of crops that allow for ATV movement between the cover crops and vines, highlighting the practical considerations necessary when implementing such a project. A well-timed 75mm of rain while soil temperatures were still high created ideal growing conditions for the newly sown crops. “They are charging with all that luscious seed coating, water and warmth,” noted Murray, adding, “I’d like to try and set up a self-sustaining system where I’m not spending of lot of time (and) money and emitting carbon.” To achieve this, alternating rows of cover crops will be allowed to go to seed and be harvested, reducing the need for annual replanting. Murray is eager to understand which cover crops are most suited to the region’s drying climate, and will monitor soil health, soil biology, earthworm presence, and soil penetration resistance to validate the efficacy of the cover crops in improving soil conditions across the vineyard.
Karlee Bertola, who operates King River Avocados, is running a similar demonstration. Building on cover crop experimentation commenced prior to this project, Karlee’s demonstration is enabling her to trial different planting times and assess the potential for self-regeneration. “Previous sowing has gone to seed…and is now regenerating naturally, which is pretty interesting and adding to the biodiversity in the orchard,” observed Karlee. Both Murray and Karlee are establishing these systems with no chemical inputs, relying instead on organic methods to encourage healthy crops and supress weeds. Across Karlee’s orchards, weeds are solarised with matting prior to cover crops being sown. While time consuming, this method has proven successful for creating the conditions necessary for plants to thrive without weed competition. Control sites form part of this demonstration, ensuring meaningful data can be collected around the impacts of the practices being applied.
Two further demonstration sites, one on a pastoral station near Yalgoo, the other on a much smaller property near Bridegtown, seek to understand the feasibility of virtual fencing in two vastly different contexts. Despite facing incredibly different conditions and challenges, both ultimately aim to demonstrate novel, achievable management practices that enable regeneration and improve productivity.
For Vanessa Kirley, virtual fencing presents an opportunity to overcome the difficulties of fencing off uneven, hard-to-reach creek lines in order to protect riparian vegetation and promote biodiversity while facilitating rotational grazing. Gemma Cripps sees virtual fencing as a way to implement rotational grazing to restore soil, pasture, and livestock health in a rangeland environment, without the extensive labour and cost involved in constructing physical fences. You can read more about Gemma’s existing virtual fencing trial here.
In Perenjori, a paddock-scale trial in a wheat crop run by Peter Bestry will explore the role of humic and/or fulvic acid in cropping fertiliser programs as an alternative to UAN/urea. This practice, according to Peter “…could quite easily be incorporated into current conventional practices.” Promoting practicable changes like this is a key part of what these demonstrations aim to do: illustrate that regenerative practices can be incorporated into any system, by anyone, at any pace and scale. Often, a first step can be as simple as substitution! Soil and plant tissue testing, both pre and post treatment, and across the treatment and control paddock, will generate credible data to assess the impact of this practice in a low-rainfall, broad-acre cropping context.
As these demonstrations progress, participating host farmers will share their insights through a series of field days. To stay informed about these upcoming opportunities, we encourage you to subscribe to our newsletter and regularly visit our website. Each demonstration will also be supported by detailed case studies, which will be available through our website, newsletter, and social media channels.
This project is supported by funding through the Western Australian Government’s State NRM Program.
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